Latest / UK Column Radio / UK Column News — 16th September 2026

Transcript

UK Column News — 16th September 2026 · UK Column Radio

0:08
Speaker 1: Good afternoon.
0:08
Speaker 2: It's Wednesday, the 16th of September, 2026, just after one o'clock.
0:12
Speaker 2: Welcome to UK Column News. I'm your host, Mike Robinson.
0:14
Speaker 2: Joining me in the studio today is Charles Mallett. Welcome
0:16
Speaker 2: to the program, Charles.
0:17
Speaker 1: Thank you, Mike. It's been a while.
0:18
Speaker 3: Yeah, it has.
0:19
Speaker 2: And Vanessa Bailey joins us by video link from Lebanon. Now,
0:21
Speaker 2: later in the program, we'll be reporting on mass demonstrations
0:25
Speaker 2: in Syria. We'll have the latest digital ID news from
0:28
Speaker 2: here in the UK. And, well, the question is, will
0:31
Speaker 2: Argentina call Britain's bluff and take back the Falklands Islands?
0:35
Speaker 2: behalf of Israel, perhaps, Charles? But we'll begin today with
0:40
Speaker 2: war spending, because the BBC this morning had this story headlined,
0:45
Speaker 2: UK and talks about joining global defence bank led by Canada.
0:50
Speaker 2: And the article says, Chancellor John Healey is considering a
0:53
Speaker 2: bid to join the Defence Security and Resilience Bank, not
0:56
Speaker 2: long after his predecessor, Rachel Reeves, rejected the idea Canada
1:01
Speaker 2: has been leading efforts to establish the bank which supporters
1:03
Speaker 2: say would enable governments to borrow at lower costs to
1:07
Speaker 2: increase military spending. Well, that's at least partly nonsense. Britain,
1:12
Speaker 2: in fact, was the country that led efforts to establish
1:15
Speaker 2: the bank. We'll come on to that in a second.
1:17
Speaker 2: The idea for the Global Defence Bank, otherwise known as
1:21
Speaker 2: the Defence Security and Resilience Bank, or DSRB, began with
1:25
Speaker 2: a 2019 briefing by former British Armoury Officer Rob Murray,
1:29
Speaker 2: who's now NATO's head of innovation. And that was given
1:33
Speaker 2: to the office of the NATO Secretary General. It was
1:35
Speaker 2: developed publicly through a 2020 Atlantic Council paper by Max
1:39
Speaker 2: Bergman and Sienna Cicerelli entitled Open a Bank. And then
1:45
Speaker 2: in April 2023, Financial Times opinion piece by Murray and
1:49
Speaker 2: Murray's full-length Atlantic Council in-depth report followed on. That was
1:56
Speaker 2: called How a New Global Defense Bank, the Defense, Security,
2:00
Speaker 2: and Resilience Bank Can Solve U.S. and Allied Funding Problems.
2:03
Speaker 2: And that was published on the 13th of December, 2024.
2:06
Speaker 2: So political momentum built rapidly in 2025 because NATO members
2:14
Speaker 2: at the Hague in June 2025, the Hague Summit adopted
2:19
Speaker 2: a 5% of GDP defense investment pledge. And then in
2:22
Speaker 2: July 2025, a UK government task force, which was co-chaired
2:27
Speaker 2: by Rachel Reeves and the then Defense Secretary John Healey,
2:32
Speaker 2: endorsed the creation of the DSRB. And in August 2025,
2:38
Speaker 2: transatlantic financial leaders, including JPMorgan Chase, Commerce Bank, ING Group
2:43
Speaker 2: and Landis Bank, Baden-Württemberg announced their public backing. But then
2:49
Speaker 2: on the 8th of September last year, the DSRB announced
2:52
Speaker 2: Development Group convened a meeting in the city of London,
2:56
Speaker 2: and that was attended by representatives from 37 nations, including
3:00
Speaker 2: all the G7 nations, the European Commission, NATO, the European Parliament,
3:04
Speaker 2: and also the global ratings agencies. Now, the European Parliament
3:08
Speaker 2: passed a resolution urging EU member states to participate. And
3:14
Speaker 2: then on the 29th of April this year, after charter
3:17
Speaker 2: negotiations in Montreal, 19 founding member nations unanimously agreed selected
3:22
Speaker 2: Canada as the bank's host country. That was led by
3:25
Speaker 2: Prime Minister Mark Carney. But of course, in the meantime,
3:30
Speaker 2: the UK had decided that it was going to step
3:31
Speaker 2: back from it. And that resulted in this, which was
3:34
Speaker 2: the resignation of John Healey as Defence Secretary at the time.
3:39
Speaker 2: And as you remember, he said, as I've outlined to you,
3:41
Speaker 2: there are credible ways of meeting the midterm funding challenges.
3:45
Speaker 2: And he was clearly referring to the DSRB. And as
3:49
Speaker 2: I say, the leader of the as far as wanting
3:53
Speaker 2: to host the thing was Mark Carney. And that's where
3:56
Speaker 2: the BBC gets the sort of Canada part of it.
4:02
Speaker 2: So the question, what happened then, of course, is that
4:06
Speaker 2: Healy resigned. The City of London event was happened that
4:12
Speaker 2: the British government pulled out of, and that's why Healy resigned.
4:16
Speaker 2: And then what happened then was that Canada resigned Once
4:21
Speaker 2: Burnham became Prime Minister, urged him to reconsider joining the
4:25
Speaker 2: Global Defence Bank. And that seems to be exactly what
4:29
Speaker 2: has happened. The Financial Times then was making the point
4:34
Speaker 2: just after Burnham became Prime Minister and then made John
4:38
Speaker 2: Healey Chancellor of the Exchequer. They were making the point
4:42
Speaker 2: that that resulted in shares rising in war, you know,
4:47
Speaker 2: military related shares rising. And of course that was going
4:50
Speaker 2: to be the result of the, uh, or at least
4:53
Speaker 2: the response by the markets. Um, so let's just, uh,
4:57
Speaker 2: remind ourselves what this is all about, uh, because the DSRB, uh,
5:02
Speaker 2: if we bring this on screen is, uh, can set
5:07
Speaker 2: up this way. It provides direct lending to allied governments.
5:11
Speaker 2: It also provides hedging and leasing services between allies. and
5:17
Speaker 2: it's also supposed to create supply chain guarantees. It's a
5:20
Speaker 2: multilateral lending institution, absolutely modeled on the World Bank. It's
5:28
Speaker 2: going to be owned by the participating nation states, and
5:31
Speaker 2: it's designed to finance defense, security, and resilience investments across
5:36
Speaker 2: NATO members and allied democracies. Its central business, as I say,
5:41
Speaker 2: is loans and so on. But the question then is
5:45
Speaker 2: how does that actually work in practice? Well, they are
5:49
Speaker 2: going to have two forms of capital. They're going to
5:52
Speaker 2: have what's called paid-in capital. It's where the countries that
5:55
Speaker 2: are involved actually put money into the thing. Well, the
5:59
Speaker 2: countries that are involved don't have any money to put
6:01
Speaker 2: into the thing. So that's where the second part of
6:03
Speaker 2: this comes in, which is subscribed capital, if we just
6:06
Speaker 2: put that back on screen for a second. And this
6:09
Speaker 2: is where basically there are pledges made as a result,
6:13
Speaker 2: and the aim here is to be able to create
6:15
Speaker 2: AAA rated sovereign bonds. And this is why it was
6:18
Speaker 2: important that at that city of London meeting, the ratings
6:22
Speaker 2: agencies were there and that they seem to be on
6:24
Speaker 2: board with this. But here's the kicker for us as taxpayers.
6:31
Speaker 2: Any money loans to countries on the basis of this
6:35
Speaker 2: arrangement basically are off the balance sheet. And so what
6:40
Speaker 2: does that mean? That means that we can't know, unless
6:43
Speaker 2: we're told, and it's unlikely that we're going to be
6:45
Speaker 2: told everything, we can't know how much money is actually
6:48
Speaker 2: being generated through these bonds and how much money individual
6:54
Speaker 2: countries are spending on this stuff. It's quite an incredible situation. Now,
7:00
Speaker 2: there have been some noises from City of London-type organizations saying,
7:05
Speaker 2: you're not going to fool us. Obviously, bonds are going
7:08
Speaker 2: to be issued. So there's going to be an idea
7:10
Speaker 2: of the total amount of money that's being raised by
7:12
Speaker 2: this thing. But us as British taxpayers won't know how
7:15
Speaker 2: much our government is paying. And that is just an
7:18
Speaker 2: incredible situation, Charles.
7:20
Speaker 1: It's completely incredible. And regulated by whom? Well, precisely.
7:25
Speaker 4: Yeah.
7:25
Speaker 5: I mean, you know, I think there are a huge
7:28
Speaker 5: number of questions to this, but it's so very obvious.
7:31
Speaker 5: I mean, what you just showed, financial times, clearly this
7:34
Speaker 5: benefits the defence industry. so-called defence industry and pretty much
7:37
Speaker 5: nobody else. And if you've got to the point where
7:39
Speaker 5: you're trying to run an economy and you find that
7:45
Speaker 5: you can't actually pay for a war that you're wanting
7:47
Speaker 5: to have, that might be a moment to think about
7:49
Speaker 5: whether or not it's the right thing to be doing
7:51
Speaker 5: in the first place.
7:51
Speaker 1: But again, apparently not.
7:53
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, we might not know how much money
7:55
Speaker 2: is being spent by the British government on this stuff,
7:57
Speaker 2: how much money they're actually taking from this bank, but
7:59
Speaker 2: our children, our grandchildren are going to know about it
8:02
Speaker 2: because we are going to have to pay that back
8:04
Speaker 2: at some point. Unless, you know, they do actually manage
8:07
Speaker 2: to succeed in kicking off a war and we don't
8:10
Speaker 2: need to worry about anything anymore.
8:11
Speaker 1: Well, there we go. Yeah. Make it up. Yes.
8:14
Speaker 2: Okay. Let's move on from there then. And Lucy Ledby, Charles,
8:19
Speaker 2: what's the latest on this story?
8:20
Speaker 5: Well, back in the news, because finally, after quite some
8:26
Speaker 5: considerable period of time, a report has been published by
8:29
Speaker 5: the Thirlwall Inquiry. This is something that's been run by
8:34
Speaker 5: Lady Justice Thirlwall from 2023. So it's taken three years
8:38
Speaker 5: to put this together. A very, very long report has
8:41
Speaker 5: been published. And it's essentially to examine the events, or
8:45
Speaker 5: at least in its own words, examining the events at
8:48
Speaker 5: the Countess of Chester Hospital between 2015 and 2018. I
8:53
Speaker 5: think it might be fair to say that it is
8:56
Speaker 5: also a terrific insight into the purpose of an establishment
9:00
Speaker 5: organization inquiry, or indeed how to cover up what you
9:04
Speaker 5: want to cover up. As for Lady Justice Thirlwall herself,
9:08
Speaker 5: she wrote in a way to introduce the report, she wrote,
9:12
Speaker 5: my focus has been on the questions asked in the
9:16
Speaker 5: terms of reference, not on the guilt of Lucy Letby
9:19
Speaker 5: or on her convictions. Now, it's interesting that she would
9:24
Speaker 5: make such a statement because this would seem to be
9:26
Speaker 5: demonstrably not true both in the report itself, but also
9:30
Speaker 5: in the very terms of reference that she says that
9:32
Speaker 5: she's been adhering to. So the terms of reference, as
9:36
Speaker 5: they were set out in 2023, were said to be
9:38
Speaker 5: covering three broad areas. And I'm not going to go
9:43
Speaker 5: through all of them, but some of them are to
9:46
Speaker 5: cover the conduct of those working at the hospital with
9:49
Speaker 5: regard to the actions of Lucy Letby, whether Lucy Letby
9:53
Speaker 5: should have been suspended earlier, and whether the Trust's Culture Management, sorry,
9:58
Speaker 5: this is the NHS Trust, to the failure to protect
10:01
Speaker 5: babies from Lucy Letby. In other words, the whole predication
10:13
Speaker 5: of the inquiry is in effect a fixation on the
10:15
Speaker 5: position that the only thing that went wrong during that
10:18
Speaker 5: period was the presence of Lucy Letby herself. So her
10:23
Speaker 5: words are absolutely contradicted by what has been put out. Now,
10:29
Speaker 5: at almost exactly the same time, which seems like a
10:31
Speaker 5: remarkable coincidence, we have the Daily Telegraph here reporting that
10:34
Speaker 5: two experts quit Letby's defence team over inconsistent arguments. In particular,
10:43
Speaker 5: what's said is that two of the scientists who've been
10:46
Speaker 5: effectively used by the defence to form an independent panel
10:50
Speaker 5: of scientists to undermine the conviction of Lucy Letby, they're
10:57
Speaker 5: quoted as saying, whilst it's entirely legitimate for the defence
11:00
Speaker 5: to advance multiple arguments, some of the other arguments now
11:04
Speaker 5: being put forward we cannot support as scientifically credible and
11:08
Speaker 5: and which have, in our view, fundamental unresolvable problems. Now,
11:13
Speaker 5: as obviously exemplified by the fact that that's been printed
11:16
Speaker 5: in the Telegraph, this has been seized upon by the
11:19
Speaker 5: mainstream media who are consistently desperate that Lucy Letby is
11:23
Speaker 5: guilty and that we're all reminded all the time that
11:26
Speaker 5: she is guilty. But at first glance, what is said
11:30
Speaker 5: by those scientists might of course seem problematic because it
11:32
Speaker 5: does seem fairly fundamental. It seems emphatic, might seem undermining,
11:37
Speaker 5: but this is explained or at least set in context
11:39
Speaker 5: by Mark McDonald, who's the barrister who's been representing Lucy
11:44
Speaker 5: Letby over this whole period. And he appeared on BBC
11:48
Speaker 5: Newsnight with Victoria Derbyshire, who was very much attempting to
11:51
Speaker 5: give him an extremely hard time about this, but this
11:54
Speaker 5: is how he handled the, uh, well, the quitting of
11:58
Speaker 5: these two so-called experts.
12:02
Speaker 6: I asked Mr MacDonald if their withdrawal damaged his attempt
12:06
Speaker 6: to persuade the CCRC to refer the Letby case to
12:09
Speaker 6: the Court of Appeal.
12:12
Speaker 1: It doesn't.
12:12
Speaker 4: Of course it doesn't.
12:13
Speaker 6: It absolutely undermines your case. They are saying some of
12:16
Speaker 6: what you're putting forward is demonstrably inaccurate and creates serious
12:21
Speaker 6: ethical issues.
12:21
Speaker 4: Yes, I disagree with that.
12:24
Speaker 6: You can't dismiss it just like that. These are experts
12:26
Speaker 6: in their field. And up until today, they were backing
12:30
Speaker 6: you and now they're not.
12:32
Speaker 4: No, they weren't backing me. They were showing that the
12:35
Speaker 4: conviction and the assay testing that was put before the
12:38
Speaker 4: jury was unreliable. That's what they were showing. What they're
12:43
Speaker 4: saying is, we think our argument's better than your argument
12:46
Speaker 4: and therefore we're coming out of it. Now, that's one
12:48
Speaker 4: way of doing it. The other way of doing it is,
12:50
Speaker 4: stay in. go to the CCRC, let the Court of
12:54
Speaker 4: Appeal decide.
12:55
Speaker 6: Or stand by your principles. Or stand by your principles
12:59
Speaker 6: and pull out because some of the stuff you're putting forward,
13:02
Speaker 6: they say, is inaccurate.
13:04
Speaker 4: Well, they may say that they haven't seen everything. I mean,
13:06
Speaker 4: that's the other problem. The one thing I didn't do
13:09
Speaker 4: is show every expert every other person's report because that
13:13
Speaker 4: would be wrong. That would undermine the event. They haven't
13:16
Speaker 4: seen everything.
13:17
Speaker 6: But what they're saying is some of the arguments now
13:18
Speaker 6: being put forward we cannot support are scientifically credible.
13:21
Speaker 4: Yes, but they don't know what the arguments are. Right.
13:24
Speaker 4: So that's their press release. That's what they've said.
13:27
Speaker 6: That's their letter to the CCRC.
13:29
Speaker 4: Well, no, that's an email that was sent at midnight
13:31
Speaker 4: last night. I know because I was CC'd into it.
13:34
Speaker 4: That's what they say. I fundamentally disagree with it. And
13:38
Speaker 4: more importantly, they don't know what I put into the
13:41
Speaker 4: CCRC because I haven't told them. So how on earth
13:45
Speaker 4: could they make that conclusion? But really, it comes back
13:48
Speaker 4: to this. Both sets of experts say... that Lucy Letby
13:52
Speaker 4: is innocent, right? One set of expert remains in the CCRC.
13:57
Speaker 4: One set of experts have withdrawn. But they both are
14:00
Speaker 4: of the same position that whatever happened at the trial,
14:04
Speaker 4: what took place at the trial was wrong.
14:06
Speaker 1: So I think you mentioned.
14:09
Speaker 5: extremely important points and some very compelling ones but essentially
14:13
Speaker 5: the the logic of the position that has apparently been
14:15
Speaker 5: taken therefore reported by the telegraph the bbc and all
14:18
Speaker 5: the rest of it is that there seems to be
14:19
Speaker 5: a disagreement with something that cannot actually be known because
14:22
Speaker 5: he hasn't shared it with them and i think this
14:24
Speaker 5: is a number of uh one of a number of
14:27
Speaker 5: very many contradictions that run the whole way through this
14:30
Speaker 5: and and indeed in the report and one of the
14:32
Speaker 5: points you know from from the report as i say
14:34
Speaker 5: it's very very long there is a sentence which says
14:37
Speaker 5: that um If the babies whom Letby was convicted of
14:43
Speaker 5: murdering were removed from the annual number of deaths in
14:46
Speaker 5: the neonatal unit, the mortality figures for the countess would
14:49
Speaker 5: be three deaths in 2015 and three deaths in 2016,
14:52
Speaker 5: broadly consistent with the previous year's. And that seems to
14:56
Speaker 5: be the logic that if you basically, if you take
15:01
Speaker 5: Lucy Letby out of the equation because you're absolutely convinced
15:05
Speaker 5: that she was guilty and there can be no other explanation,
15:07
Speaker 5: then all is well. And that seems to be exactly
15:10
Speaker 5: sort of where this is going. Now, as to the
15:12
Speaker 5: recommendations which were made, there were a number of them,
15:14
Speaker 5: but I think it's noteworthy that there were two in
15:17
Speaker 5: particular being pushed. The first of which was that cots
15:20
Speaker 5: and incubators in neonatal units should be fitted with baby
15:23
Speaker 5: monitors and incot cameras with live streaming video. And the
15:28
Speaker 5: other was that until access to insulin storage is controlled
15:32
Speaker 5: by biometric data, each trust should install CCTV cameras. Now, interesting,
15:37
Speaker 5: because of course, there were 17 recommendations, and yet it
15:40
Speaker 5: was these two that were given enormous amounts of prominence. Now,
15:45
Speaker 5: such as being the ferocity with which Letby's apparent guilt
15:47
Speaker 5: has been defended, it's often seemed like there's a greater
15:50
Speaker 5: purpose to this conviction. But just before we comment further
15:55
Speaker 5: on that, I'm just going to go to the BMA
15:58
Speaker 5: because they put out a statement which was much more
16:03
Speaker 5: mild in its language. They said that what is immediately apparent, however,
16:08
Speaker 5: is that the hospital's management was simply not up to
16:11
Speaker 5: the task of keeping patients safe. After multiple senior doctors
16:15
Speaker 5: raised concerns, they were palmed off and told to stop
16:18
Speaker 5: causing a fuss. This is sadly not unusual in the NHS.
16:22
Speaker 5: So the point to be made there is that they
16:24
Speaker 5: were really calling for regulation of non-clinical managers, which is
16:28
Speaker 5: where they see the problem lying. And Tom Dolphin, who's
16:31
Speaker 5: their chair, was pushed very hard on the idea of
16:34
Speaker 5: cameras were a great idea. This was the BBC this morning.
16:38
Speaker 5: He resisted that and said that greater consideration needs to
16:42
Speaker 5: be gone into. And I think just as a kind
16:45
Speaker 5: of closing remark, just the timing of this seems deliberate,
16:49
Speaker 5: a sort of deliberate attempt to destabilise the outcome of
16:52
Speaker 5: the Criminal Cases Review Commission, the CCRC, into the decision
16:56
Speaker 5: of whether or not this is going to be overturned.
16:58
Speaker 5: So I think there's plenty more to talk about it,
17:00
Speaker 5: but I don't know if you've got any thoughts on it.
17:02
Speaker 2: Just very quickly, I mean, At the end of the day,
17:05
Speaker 2: I think there are absolutely enough people raising enough concerns
17:09
Speaker 2: about the veracity of the original conviction that there should
17:12
Speaker 2: be no hesitation about putting it into the appeals court.
17:15
Speaker 2: At the end of the day, an appeal is another
17:18
Speaker 2: judicial process where evidence is presented and the decision has
17:22
Speaker 2: to be made on the basis of the evidence. If
17:24
Speaker 2: the conviction is signed, then what's the problem about doing that?
17:28
Speaker 1: Exactly.
17:29
Speaker 5: And an entire inquiry has, in effect, wasted three years
17:32
Speaker 5: because it has been fixated on something that may actually
17:34
Speaker 5: not be the case.
17:35
Speaker 2: And how many millions? I mean, it looks to me,
17:37
Speaker 2: I could be wrong about this, it's just my opinion,
17:40
Speaker 2: but it looks to me that this is a massive
17:41
Speaker 2: cover-up because of what was going on at the hospital.
17:44
Speaker 2: And I think it's happening in other hospitals as well.
17:46
Speaker 1: Indeed, yeah.
17:48
Speaker 2: Vanessa, let's welcome you to the programme. And of course,
17:52
Speaker 2: you know, we've been talking about what's been going on
17:54
Speaker 2: in Syria for many, many years. You've been highlighting... the
17:58
Speaker 2: likely implications of Jelani becoming the president there since the
18:04
Speaker 2: overthrow of Bashar al-Assad. Now we're starting to see people
18:09
Speaker 2: out on the streets again.
18:12
Speaker 3: Yes, protests again in Syria. Of course, not protests over
18:17
Speaker 3: the mass ethnic cleansing, massacres of minorities, displacement of minorities,
18:23
Speaker 3: the theft of homes by foreign mercenary terrorist groups. But
18:29
Speaker 3: this is over the rising of, or the raising, sorry,
18:33
Speaker 3: of fuel prices in an unprecedented hike. Now, what this
18:39
Speaker 3: actually means, there have been mass protests across Syria and across,
18:42
Speaker 3: I think, across about eight provinces. But what did this
18:46
Speaker 3: actually mean? So here is an image of one of
18:49
Speaker 3: the road closures. They've effectively been burning tires to prevent
18:53
Speaker 3: the road transport companies bringing oil from any of the
18:59
Speaker 3: areas that produces oil in the region into Syria. And effectively,
19:06
Speaker 3: on Sunday, the new prices were announced. So basically, all
19:11
Speaker 3: petroleum products. Diesel had a 40% rise, and that's probably
19:17
Speaker 3: the product that is most used, particularly, of course, by
19:20
Speaker 3: the agricultural sector in Syria. Gasoline, 28% rise. Household gas cylinders,
19:27
Speaker 3: 9% rise. And that includes industrial gas cylinders also that
19:33
Speaker 3: run to a large degree, the health service and so on.
19:37
Speaker 3: On top of that, I'm going to add the rising
19:39
Speaker 3: education costs. If I can just go back for a second, William, please.
19:44
Speaker 3: The rising education costs, the privatization of hospitals, and of course,
19:48
Speaker 3: the soaring unemployment Much of that is down to the
19:51
Speaker 3: fact that members of the various minority communities have been
19:56
Speaker 3: sacked from their jobs from December 2024 onwards. But if
20:01
Speaker 3: we actually, I actually also just want to show this
20:04
Speaker 3: 10 seconds of video showing the HTS or al-Qaeda reaction
20:11
Speaker 3: to the protest. So forgive me, Mike, but the current
20:29
Speaker 3: Syrian government is firing on protesters. Wouldn't that be a
20:34
Speaker 3: violent crackdown, exactly the same as the one that was
20:36
Speaker 3: described to criminalize President Assad back in 2011? But if
20:42
Speaker 3: we move on to the map of Syria, we can
20:45
Speaker 3: see where really the protests were focused. There were some
20:50
Speaker 3: to the south of Damascus, but the majority, for example,
20:53
Speaker 3: were in areas like Hamar to the west there, up
20:58
Speaker 3: into Idlib, Aleppo, and then across the eastern sector there
21:03
Speaker 3: in Hasakah, but also closing the roads between Raqqa and
21:08
Speaker 3: Deir ez-Zor, and also closing the roads coming from Turkey
21:11
Speaker 3: and coming from northern Syria down to Damascus. So basically...
21:16
Speaker 3: paralyzing the country pretty much and actually stopping the supply,
21:20
Speaker 3: as I said, of any petroleum products into the capital
21:24
Speaker 3: in particular. Now, we do have to remember that this
21:28
Speaker 3: comes on the back of President Trump lifting the Caesar sanctions,
21:32
Speaker 3: some of the most barbaric economic pressure put on Syria
21:38
Speaker 3: unprecedented in years, although Syria, of course, had been under
21:42
Speaker 3: sanctions since 1979. But the most recent is that the
21:45
Speaker 3: Arab League ends 15 years of sanctions. So while the
21:50
Speaker 3: sanctions are being lifted, investment allegedly is coming into the country.
21:54
Speaker 3: And yet the current al-Qaeda government sees fit to basically
22:00
Speaker 3: rise prices across the board. while the country is attempting
22:03
Speaker 3: to recover. I do direct people to an article I
22:06
Speaker 3: wrote about a year ago talking about Tom Barrack and
22:09
Speaker 3: the globalist cabal and the crony capitalist al-Qaeda regime, and
22:15
Speaker 3: exactly the same scenario as in Iraq previously, money allegedly
22:19
Speaker 3: being poured into Syria, but of course not. It's going
22:22
Speaker 3: into the pockets of Washington representatives and the crony capitalist
22:29
Speaker 3: leaders now in Syria. And what was Jalani doing or
22:33
Speaker 3: Ahmed al-Shara while all this is going on, while the
22:36
Speaker 3: country is effectively burning? Well, there you go. He was
22:40
Speaker 3: at an Arab media summit in Dubai where he outlined
22:45
Speaker 3: his vision for Syria's future. So let's have a quick look.
22:50
Speaker 3: Here he is basically meeting with the vice president originally.
22:56
Speaker 3: And then let's just play the contained video. And you
23:00
Speaker 3: can see his brotherly relationship with Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahran.
23:06
Speaker 3: He spoke warmly about his relationship with the president, calling
23:10
Speaker 3: him a brother and expressing deep respect for him. Nothing
23:13
Speaker 3: to do with the money that might come in from
23:15
Speaker 3: the UAE.
23:15
Speaker 2: Of course.
23:16
Speaker 3: He said his interactions with the UAE president had left
23:19
Speaker 3: a strong impression of his credibility and approach to leadership. UAE,
23:24
Speaker 3: of course, the closest to Israel of the Zionist Arab
23:27
Speaker 3: Persian Gulf states. one of the first to sign the
23:31
Speaker 3: Abraham Accords. Then I just wanted to focus in on
23:34
Speaker 3: some of the things that Jelani actually said. So this
23:37
Speaker 3: was the first one that I picked up on. So
23:41
Speaker 3: he said, basically, this is slightly paraphrased, when Damascus was
23:45
Speaker 3: liberated in 2024, the GDP was 20 billion. In 2025,
23:46
Speaker 3: it grew to 32 billion. Expectations are that it will
23:49
Speaker 3: reach 50 billion this year. Well, hold on a minute.
23:59
Speaker 3: Let's have a look at the GDP in 2010 before
24:03
Speaker 3: Jalani and the entire Western Zionist bloc started the regime
24:08
Speaker 3: change war. Guess what? It was at 60 billion. So
24:12
Speaker 3: in 2010, Syria was an emerging economy in the Middle
24:17
Speaker 3: East area. It was progressing quickly towards a very successful, secure,
24:24
Speaker 3: stable country before, of course, the 14-year regime change war
24:28
Speaker 3: end the two years of Jolani dictatorship. And of course,
24:32
Speaker 3: as usual, what do we see? We see the poor
24:35
Speaker 3: people getting poorer and whatever investment is coming into Syria
24:40
Speaker 3: is lining the pockets of those in control. And that
24:43
Speaker 3: includes the Gulf States and Washington. And then let's have
24:49
Speaker 3: a look at a couple of the other things that
24:50
Speaker 3: he said during the conference. So he said, of course,
24:55
Speaker 3: there are great opportunities for the EU. So he basically
25:01
Speaker 3: said that this is an opportunity for investment, investment, investment.
25:07
Speaker 3: And what he's talking about, of course, is bypassing the
25:10
Speaker 3: straight informers. And this one made me laugh. So he said,
25:15
Speaker 3: Syria is transitioning from a system resembling socialism. characterized by
25:20
Speaker 3: corruption and bureaucracy, nothing to do with the current regime,
25:24
Speaker 3: of course, toward a more market-oriented system that supports the
25:27
Speaker 3: private sector and a free market economy. Sounds like global
25:32
Speaker 3: capitalism and debt enslavement to me. And then I just
25:38
Speaker 3: wanted to show, so in response to Jalani's very wishful
25:42
Speaker 3: statements from the UAE, where he said the Syrian people
25:44
Speaker 3: are so much happier since the fall of Assad, This
25:48
Speaker 3: was just one of the videos circulating where you can
25:50
Speaker 3: see Jelani's face being stamped on. And I want a
25:55
Speaker 3: reminder for people that Trump back in 2020 made it
26:00
Speaker 3: very clear when people asked him, why are you staying
26:04
Speaker 3: in Syria? Trump said, because I kept the oil, which
26:07
Speaker 3: frankly we should have done in Iraq. He added cheers
26:10
Speaker 3: and applause from the audience. The president had previously criticized
26:14
Speaker 3: his predecessors for not profiting from from Iraqi oil wells.
26:18
Speaker 3: So they say Trump's in Syria. I didn't pull out.
26:21
Speaker 3: I didn't pull out. The president continued, we have the
26:24
Speaker 3: oil really secure. We'll see what happens with it. Well,
26:28
Speaker 3: becoming increasingly clear that the people of Syria are going
26:31
Speaker 3: to have no benefit from the 16 years of interference
26:36
Speaker 3: in Syrian affairs by the West, Israel, Turkey, and the
26:39
Speaker 3: Gulf states.
26:41
Speaker 2: Indeed, plenty to talk about later in UK Column News Extra.
26:46
Speaker 2: Thank you for that, Vanessa. Okay, if you like what
26:48
Speaker 2: we do here at the UK Column, we do need
26:50
Speaker 2: your ongoing support, financial or otherwise. If you would like
26:53
Speaker 2: to support us financially, have a look at the website
26:56
Speaker 2: and the details are there. If you can't support us financially,
27:00
Speaker 2: do share any material that you find on the social
27:03
Speaker 2: media channels or on the website. And that would be
27:06
Speaker 2: of great benefit to us. Thank you very much to
27:09
Speaker 2: everybody who's supporting us in any way you possibly can.
27:12
Speaker 2: You could, of course, pick up a copy of issue
27:15
Speaker 2: three of the column, which is out now. And, well,
27:19
Speaker 2: what are your thoughts?
27:20
Speaker 1: Well, I thought you said could. Do you mean should?
27:23
Speaker 6: Yes.
27:23
Speaker 1: Yes, I think we should. It's very good.
27:25
Speaker 5: And, again, like the other two, 128 pages of pure quality.
27:31
Speaker 1: And, actually, I can't wait to get into it myself,
27:33
Speaker 1: to be perfectly honest.
27:35
Speaker 2: Indeed, that is the first lot of orders were shipped
27:40
Speaker 2: yesterday and quite a number of them. So thank you
27:42
Speaker 2: very much for everybody that's picked one up. And we're
27:44
Speaker 2: very pleased to say that Ben Rubin has produced a
27:47
Speaker 2: report which goes alongside Your Life in Their Hands called
27:50
Speaker 2: Crime and Corporation.
27:51
Speaker 1: What are your thoughts on that?
27:53
Speaker 5: Another absolutely cracking read and phenomenal detail. It sets so
27:57
Speaker 5: many things, not just in context, but the context. shows
28:00
Speaker 5: the connections between the two and why it's relevant to
28:03
Speaker 5: everything that you see in front of you today. But
28:05
Speaker 5: also I think the historical background as well is gripping.
28:08
Speaker 5: It's really, really good. And I absolutely commend it to you.
28:12
Speaker 1: Yes. And I would agree with that.
28:13
Speaker 2: And for anybody that enjoys the front page image, that
28:17
Speaker 2: is worth the cover price alone. And in fact, bearing
28:19
Speaker 2: in mind the licensing costs for that, if anybody can
28:23
Speaker 2: pick up a copy to cover that cost, that would
28:25
Speaker 2: be fantastic. Anyway, of course, don't forget that this weekend
28:29
Speaker 2: is our 20th anniversary on location event in Plymouth. If
28:33
Speaker 2: you're a few tickets left, uh, If you're able to come,
28:38
Speaker 2: we absolutely recommend it. If you're not able to come,
28:40
Speaker 2: pick up a ticket to the live stream and join
28:43
Speaker 2: us on the live stream. That's going to be a
28:45
Speaker 2: great crack as well.
28:46
Speaker 1: It really will be.
28:46
Speaker 5: And if you are coming, please look out for an
28:49
Speaker 5: email that will come into you shortly from Gemma Cooper
28:52
Speaker 5: with all the details, all the last minute information that
28:54
Speaker 5: you need. So please look out for that and digest
28:57
Speaker 5: because we want to get off on the right foot,
28:59
Speaker 5: but we're really looking forward to seeing you. And as
29:01
Speaker 5: Mike says, if you can't make it, then please come
29:02
Speaker 5: on the live stream. Also, The two publications that we've
29:05
Speaker 5: just shown you will be on sale at the shop
29:07
Speaker 5: at the event.
29:09
Speaker 2: Now, no germ warfare tonight because germ is on its
29:13
Speaker 2: way to Plymouth. So the only program tonight is 9 p.m.
29:17
Speaker 2: And it's another Chinese historical one. The Secret Alliance to
29:21
Speaker 2: Change Chinese History. Carl will be presenting that at 9 p.m.
29:25
Speaker 2: That should be good fun. Now, let's see, where does
29:28
Speaker 2: that take us then? I guess it takes us to
29:32
Speaker 2: the state of our electricity infrastructure and Palantir, in fact.
29:37
Speaker 2: So this is Neso. Neso effectively is the national grid rebranded.
29:44
Speaker 2: Is that right, Charles?
29:45
Speaker 5: Yes, in a way. I mean, it's, of course, like
29:48
Speaker 5: all these things, it's been sort of rebranding. It doesn't
29:50
Speaker 5: quite do the same thing. It's not entirely clear that
29:52
Speaker 5: it really does anything that's of much use, but nonetheless.
29:56
Speaker 2: But anyway, it is publicly owned by the British people
30:00
Speaker 2: and it manages the electricity system in this country. And
30:04
Speaker 2: they have decided to award Palantir a contract worth £ 21
30:07
Speaker 2: million with no competitive tender process required, apparently. Now, the
30:13
Speaker 2: transparency notice was put up on Find a Tender that
30:17
Speaker 2: you can see on screen at the moment. And that
30:18
Speaker 2: was put up at 6.04pm on the 26th of August.
30:22
Speaker 2: And then the earliest signature date on this is the
30:24
Speaker 2: 8th of September. So that gave us all 13 days
30:27
Speaker 2: of public notice on a £ 21 million contract. And that's
30:31
Speaker 2: assuming anybody was looking. So National Energy System Operator, as
30:36
Speaker 2: you say, runs two critical business processes under this contract.
30:40
Speaker 2: One is called Connections and the other one is called
30:42
Speaker 2: Skip Rates. We'll talk about what those are in just
30:45
Speaker 2: one second. And this is being run on Palantir's foundry platform.
30:49
Speaker 2: And the contract covers continued licensing and support for Foundry
30:55
Speaker 2: hosting both those applications and it runs until the 31st
30:58
Speaker 2: of July, 2027. And ESSO made the award directly under
31:02
Speaker 2: Section 41 of the Procurement Act 2023 using paragraph six
31:06
Speaker 2: of schedule five, which is the absence of competition for
31:09
Speaker 2: technical reasons. And the reasoning they say in this notice
31:13
Speaker 2: is that Foundry rests on proprietary architecture licensed exclusively by Palantir,
31:20
Speaker 2: and that the company holds the specialist knowledge and system
31:23
Speaker 2: knowledge needed to support Neso in what they're doing. And
31:26
Speaker 2: they say that moving to another supplier is not possible
31:29
Speaker 2: without significant cost, resource commitment, and delivery risk. It would
31:34
Speaker 2: require redeveloping the analytics environment, migrating data, obtaining security accreditation
31:39
Speaker 2: for any replacement, and retraining staff. And they say that
31:42
Speaker 2: a competitive procurement forward replacement is underway and a pre-market
31:47
Speaker 2: engagement notice has been published. But the interim contract carries
31:51
Speaker 2: six-month extensions, which brings it to the 31st of July, 2028.
31:54
Speaker 2: And it also says that there could be risks in
31:59
Speaker 2: a transition. In other words, legacy data structures, security, data quality,
32:03
Speaker 2: and regulatory compliance. And if any of those actually materialize,
32:07
Speaker 2: then the contract could be modified to extend it even
32:10
Speaker 2: further than that. So It seems to be they're giving
32:13
Speaker 2: themselves plenty of opportunity to keep going no matter what.
32:17
Speaker 2: And then a separate notice describes a strategic enterprise modeling capability,
32:23
Speaker 2: which is running from July 27 to July 2032. And
32:28
Speaker 2: that's extendable by two years. And whoever wins it, therefore,
32:33
Speaker 2: could hold it to 2034. So by the time that happens,
32:39
Speaker 2: bidding opens Palantir is going to have run the system
32:41
Speaker 2: for four years. It's going to have managed to transition
32:44
Speaker 2: out of the legacy systems. And so, you know, basically
32:49
Speaker 2: they are bought in Glide and Syncur to the federated
32:52
Speaker 2: data platform. And now let's just talk a thing, talk
32:58
Speaker 2: about the two main processes that Nestle is managing here.
33:04
Speaker 2: The first is connections to the grid. And that's everything
33:08
Speaker 2: from wood farms to data centers. But the other was
33:12
Speaker 2: this idea of so-called skip rates. Now, as many people
33:15
Speaker 2: will know, one of the main jobs of Nesso is
33:17
Speaker 2: to balance supply and demand on the grid, because if
33:20
Speaker 2: they don't do that, apparently our entire electrical network could
33:24
Speaker 2: fall over and we end up with blackouts and so on.
33:28
Speaker 2: So a skip is when a cheaper balancing action is
33:31
Speaker 2: passed over in favor of a more expensive one. And
33:35
Speaker 2: they might do this, for example, if a battery storage
33:37
Speaker 2: installation offering cheap power doesn't hold enough charge to cover
33:42
Speaker 2: the full requirement for this balancing act that they do.
33:46
Speaker 2: So these are, they say, fundamental operation processes for Britain's
33:50
Speaker 2: electricity supply. And now they both sit on Palantir and
33:56
Speaker 2: on a platform that NSO has told the government it
33:58
Speaker 2: can't leave without significant cost and risk. I'm sure we're
34:02
Speaker 2: all comfortable with that. But the biggest complainants here, by
34:06
Speaker 2: the way, because most people aren't even aware that this
34:08
Speaker 2: has been going on, are the battery storage people, the
34:13
Speaker 2: people that are building these big battery storage infrastructure things
34:17
Speaker 2: around the country, because they're providing what they consider to
34:20
Speaker 2: be cheap electricity supply and Neso is not grabbing it.
34:25
Speaker 1: I have no sympathy.
34:26
Speaker 6: No.
34:27
Speaker 1: But yes, no, it is interesting.
34:29
Speaker 5: The reason I say that is because there is absolutely
34:31
Speaker 5: no doubt that those companies battery energy storage systems, BESS,
34:35
Speaker 5: are absolutely designed with arbitrage in mind. The whole point
34:39
Speaker 5: is that they get to fleece the system by saying
34:41
Speaker 5: we're there to support this wind or this solar project.
34:44
Speaker 5: But in actual fact, they are purely there to fill
34:48
Speaker 5: up with electricity at the time they can and then
34:53
Speaker 5: sell it back to the grid when the price is
34:55
Speaker 5: suitable for them as opposed to it being of any
34:58
Speaker 5: benefit to anybody. So yet another instance that drives bills up.
35:02
Speaker 2: But sticking with energy then, nuclear fusion, is it ever
35:05
Speaker 2: going to happen?
35:05
Speaker 5: Yeah, well, that really is a question, Mike. And I'm
35:09
Speaker 5: not sure I know the answer. I'm also not at
35:11
Speaker 5: all sure the government knows the answer, but it's making
35:13
Speaker 5: out that it does. And we have an announcement from
35:15
Speaker 5: the Department of, sorry, for energy security and net zero.
35:20
Speaker 5: And this is a partnership, another partnership between the UK
35:24
Speaker 5: and the US to accelerate clean energy, apparently via, as
35:29
Speaker 5: Mike says, nuclear fusion. Now, they helpfully describe nuclear fusion.
35:35
Speaker 5: They say that it replicates the process that powers the sun.
35:38
Speaker 5: Combining hydrogen atoms to release vast amounts of energy has
35:42
Speaker 5: the potential to provide a secure source of clean energy
35:44
Speaker 5: for generations to come without producing carbon emissions during operation.
35:50
Speaker 5: And then I think a sentence that's attached to every
35:53
Speaker 5: single press release the government's ever put out, which is
35:56
Speaker 5: while creating thousands of skilled jobs, backing British businesses and
35:59
Speaker 5: unlocking significant economic opportunities for the UK. Now, how much
36:03
Speaker 5: of that you might believe is up to you. Of course,
36:07
Speaker 5: it sounds very good. And if it were to work,
36:11
Speaker 5: then that would be, in a way, a good result
36:14
Speaker 5: for the energy consumer, the country, and perhaps much else besides.
36:19
Speaker 5: But we have to ask the question, how much progress
36:22
Speaker 5: has actually been made? And so we look back to
36:24
Speaker 5: 2022 to the UK Atomic Energy Authority and and their
36:28
Speaker 5: announcement then about STEP fusion, the spherical tokamak for energy production.
36:33
Speaker 5: It's basically to use a facility up in Burton on Trent,
36:38
Speaker 5: the former power station there, the prototype for fusion energy.
36:42
Speaker 5: And they have said in the release about that particular
36:48
Speaker 5: development that it's targeting first operations in the early 2040s. Now,
36:53
Speaker 5: of course, What's not clear from the partnership I've just
36:58
Speaker 5: been describing is whether that timeline is changed at all
37:01
Speaker 5: or whether it has any effect on the project that
37:03
Speaker 5: is apparently in motion at Burton. Now, this is not
37:07
Speaker 5: an isolated announcement because, of course, at almost exactly the
37:10
Speaker 5: same time, the Atomic Energy Authority put out a release,
37:14
Speaker 5: almost mirroring, saying that there's a partnership related to fusion
37:19
Speaker 5: and it concerns supercomputers, which is to be linked across
37:23
Speaker 5: the Atlantic. So they say that the the Atomic Energy
37:27
Speaker 5: Authority and the United States Department of Energy's Princeton Plasma
37:31
Speaker 5: Physics Laboratory, PPPL, have joined forces to link their advanced
37:37
Speaker 5: fusion supercomputing platforms using artificial intelligence to accelerate fusion energy
37:42
Speaker 5: use development. I think this is where we're getting a
37:43
Speaker 5: bit closer to what it's all about. Further, Sunrise is
37:47
Speaker 5: the UK's first AI supercomputer dedicated to fusion energy, backed
37:51
Speaker 5: by £ 45 million from the UK government. and it forms
37:54
Speaker 5: the first phase of computing infrastructure underpinning the UK's first
37:58
Speaker 5: AI growth zone established at Cullum campus. So it seems
38:04
Speaker 5: at face value that this is a system designed to
38:08
Speaker 5: create energy to help AI create more energy. I think
38:15
Speaker 5: I've got that right. So in other words, When one
38:19
Speaker 5: looks at it in another way, how much help to
38:21
Speaker 5: the overall energy supply? Essentially, is NISO's job going to
38:24
Speaker 5: be made easier by any of this if it does
38:27
Speaker 5: actually happen, especially if we're considering it's not going to
38:30
Speaker 5: happen until the 2040s? Just to get a better idea
38:32
Speaker 5: of what I'm talking about, I don't mean to sound
38:34
Speaker 5: overly cynical, we will just have a look at Ofgem,
38:38
Speaker 5: because they have recently put out a document saying that
38:41
Speaker 5: they are acting to free up grid capacity by tackling
38:45
Speaker 5: speculative data center projects now mike has talked about this
38:48
Speaker 5: before but i think it's absolutely worth going into again
38:50
Speaker 5: and from their document here the proposals come as demand
38:55
Speaker 5: connection applications have surged from 41 gigawatts to 125 gigawatts
39:00
Speaker 5: in under a year this rise is driven largely by
39:03
Speaker 5: data center projects accounting for at least 80 gigawatts so
39:08
Speaker 5: the point is that this is very much describing a
39:11
Speaker 5: system that's sort of being pushed on only to be
39:13
Speaker 5: able to deal with the stuff that's actually coming along
39:16
Speaker 5: the pipeline, which is a completely perverse set of circumstances.
39:21
Speaker 5: And on top of this, I just want to remind
39:23
Speaker 5: you what it is that NISO says. And this relates
39:26
Speaker 5: very much to what Mike's just been talking about, the
39:28
Speaker 5: balancing mechanism and the the skip costs and the rest
39:31
Speaker 5: of it. But the constraints collaboration project, which is basically
39:34
Speaker 5: where the money has to go once something needs to
39:36
Speaker 5: be switched off. Transmission thermal constraint costs are increasing year
39:41
Speaker 5: on year as more renewable projects come online. I mean,
39:43
Speaker 5: that alone takes some beating. And it goes on to
39:47
Speaker 5: say the majority of constraint management action projects taken by
39:50
Speaker 5: the niso involve the redispatch or curtailment of generators leading
39:55
Speaker 5: to increasing cost and carbon impact so in a sense
40:00
Speaker 5: nice idea if fusion were the answer were the solution
40:03
Speaker 5: but when on earth is it going to happen.
40:05
Speaker 2: Well that's i said to you before the program charles
40:07
Speaker 2: 50 years ago is a 50-year problem and it's still a.
40:10
Speaker 5: 50-year problem i suppose the other issue which we might
40:13
Speaker 5: touch on an extra is who's going to make the
40:14
Speaker 5: money out of it.
40:14
Speaker 2: Uh indeed um okay so uh Vanessa, let's come on
40:23
Speaker 2: to the question of whether Mr. Jelani is going to
40:29
Speaker 2: stick around for very much longer as president of Syria.
40:34
Speaker 3: Well, I think that's one of the questions in the mix.
40:38
Speaker 3: The other question is whether the protests are being engineered,
40:43
Speaker 3: and we'll get onto that right now. But first of all,
40:46
Speaker 3: this was an image that was sent to me that
40:48
Speaker 3: was found in Turkish media, apparently taken from a secret
40:54
Speaker 3: Ministry of Defense presentation, which, as you can see, shows
40:59
Speaker 3: very clearly, if you bring it in closer, the annexation
41:03
Speaker 3: of Syrian territory from the north all the way down
41:07
Speaker 3: to Latakia on the coast, so the entire coastal area, which,
41:11
Speaker 3: of course, does tie in with the Mavi Vatan or
41:16
Speaker 3: the Blue Homeland doctrine that Erdogan is attempting to bring
41:21
Speaker 3: to fruition, which, of course, is the control of the
41:24
Speaker 3: eastern Mediterranean and the Aegean seas, which brings him into
41:29
Speaker 3: conflict with Greece, hence why Greece and Cyprus and Israel
41:32
Speaker 3: are forming a coalition to deal with that part of it.
41:36
Speaker 3: But this was quite interesting. This was an article that
41:39
Speaker 3: someone sent to me that had been published in Turkish media.
41:42
Speaker 3: This is a very bad translation, but it gives you
41:45
Speaker 3: an idea. Preparations to go to Damascus disrupted Israel's plans.
41:49
Speaker 3: Erdogan's visit was the murderer's scribe. I'm not quite sure
41:52
Speaker 3: how that translated into that. But basically what they're saying
41:56
Speaker 3: in the article is that Israel or Netanyahu was planning
42:00
Speaker 3: to to go to Damascus to make a speech in
42:03
Speaker 3: Damascus regarding his control of Syria or strategic points in
42:08
Speaker 3: Syria prior to the Israeli elections. He was derailed by
42:14
Speaker 3: the arrival of Hakan Fidan, the Turkish foreign minister. And basically,
42:22
Speaker 3: Netanyahu then put a deal through to Turkey saying that
42:27
Speaker 3: Can we divide Syria? That allegedly was refused by Turkey.
42:33
Speaker 3: And now in the media report, they're saying maybe Israel
42:36
Speaker 3: will start orchestrating protests and riots in order to be
42:41
Speaker 3: able to invade Syria. Now, while all of that may
42:45
Speaker 3: have some credence or veracity, let's have a look at
42:50
Speaker 3: what Hakan Fidan actually said during his very recent visit
42:54
Speaker 3: to Syria. So he started basically criticizing Israel, which is
42:59
Speaker 3: quite normal, despite the fact that Turkey has been supplying
43:02
Speaker 3: oil and metal and weapon parts to Israel since October
43:07
Speaker 3: the 7th, even during the genocide. So he said, Israel
43:11
Speaker 3: is such a conditioned state. We saw this in the
43:14
Speaker 3: Gaza genocide. It cannot even imagine another policy than bloodshed.
43:19
Speaker 3: An entire region is approached through the language of threat
43:22
Speaker 3: and hostility. He then also went on to say, as
43:28
Speaker 3: long as everyone in the region stays within their own borders,
43:31
Speaker 3: does not covet anyone else's land, does not work to
43:34
Speaker 3: destabilize others, there is enough economic prosperity, happiness and peace
43:39
Speaker 3: for everyone. Now, I would take that as a message
43:42
Speaker 3: to Israel, despite their refusal of the Israeli proposal, that
43:49
Speaker 3: there is potential for coming to an agreement over Syrian territory.
43:54
Speaker 3: It's also sort of overwhelmingly ironic, Turkey saying something like that,
44:00
Speaker 3: when of course they were responsible very much for the
44:02
Speaker 3: invasion of Syria from the beginning, from 2011. Then let's
44:07
Speaker 3: have a look at this, how Turkey's possible annexation will
44:12
Speaker 3: tie in with the Israeli vision for Syria. So this
44:16
Speaker 3: is about the David's Corridor, which is to the east
44:19
Speaker 3: of Syria there. So Israel coming in through the southern territory,
44:23
Speaker 3: which it's already beginning to occupy and annex, and then
44:27
Speaker 3: going up the eastern flank, potentially into Iraq and potentially
44:33
Speaker 3: further to the west, the northwest. so taking control of
44:37
Speaker 3: the oil-rich region. And then Turkey coming down, it already
44:42
Speaker 3: has control of the northern territories up to the northeast,
44:47
Speaker 3: and then coming down towards the north of Lebanon, which
44:51
Speaker 3: of course is where Turkey also has interests in Tripoli
44:55
Speaker 3: to the north of Lebanon. And so potentially there being
44:59
Speaker 3: a carving up of Syria and that all of this
45:02
Speaker 3: rhetoric that's coming from both Israel and Turkey is just
45:06
Speaker 3: all about making gains inside Syria. Now, I did ask
45:09
Speaker 3: someone whether there was any potential for an invasion of
45:12
Speaker 3: Damascus by Israel, and they told me the likelihood Israel
45:16
Speaker 3: will come to the borders or very close to the
45:19
Speaker 3: border of Damascus, and then negotiations will begin to basically
45:24
Speaker 3: carve the country up. So again, let's wait and see.
45:28
Speaker 3: But very interesting at the same time, that Russian naval
45:32
Speaker 3: vessels have been seen arriving at their former naval base
45:36
Speaker 3: in Tartus. Remember, we've reported on the new deal between
45:41
Speaker 3: Jelani and Russia, where effectively Russia has lost much of
45:45
Speaker 3: the control over the naval and military bases on the
45:49
Speaker 3: eastern Syrian coastal area. But the fact that these ships
45:52
Speaker 3: have appeared now, according to the report, it's the naval
45:58
Speaker 3: destroyer Admiral Levchenko, The Sparta, a military logistics vessel, and
46:04
Speaker 3: the academic Pashin, a replenishment vessel designed for supplying other
46:08
Speaker 3: ships at sea. The fourth vessel of the flotilla, the
46:12
Speaker 3: oil tank called General Skorbelev, is not visible in the image.
46:17
Speaker 3: And according to the report, the docking of Russian vessels
46:21
Speaker 3: backs up analyst assessments that coal geopolitical bargaining has enabled
46:25
Speaker 3: the Kremlin to hold onto its bases in Syria, which
46:28
Speaker 3: of course is their launchpad into Africa. Syria's new leadership
46:33
Speaker 3: needed things only Russia could offer, Ruslan Trad, a Syria analyst,
46:37
Speaker 3: told RFE. Among other factors, Syria's weapon stocks are largely
46:42
Speaker 3: Russian and Damascus needs to refill the warehouses. Now, there
46:46
Speaker 3: is potential for that, that Russia will provide weapons to
46:50
Speaker 3: Jalani for maintaining the base on the eastern coast. But
46:53
Speaker 3: I would also suggest that this is an attempt by
46:56
Speaker 3: Russia to protect its assets if Turkey is going to
46:59
Speaker 3: expand into the coastal region.
47:03
Speaker 4: Okay.
47:03
Speaker 2: Thank you for that, Vanessa.
47:05
Speaker 1: Okay.
47:05
Speaker 2: Back to the UK then. And well, everybody will be
47:08
Speaker 2: delighted to know if we bring this on screen that pubs, bars, restaurants,
47:13
Speaker 2: music venues, and other licensed premises across England and Wales
47:16
Speaker 2: are going to have the choice to introduce digital proof
47:19
Speaker 2: of age for alcohol sales under new rules coming into force. Well,
47:23
Speaker 2: they did come into force yesterday. So that's according to
47:27
Speaker 2: the Andy Burnham regime. Instead of handing over a card
47:30
Speaker 2: with your name and address, you'll show a QR code
47:33
Speaker 2: or tap your phone and staff get a yes or
47:35
Speaker 2: a no. It's going to be optional for businesses and
47:38
Speaker 2: it runs on certified third party providers rather than a
47:43
Speaker 2: government app. So that'll be Yoti or the likes of that,
47:46
Speaker 2: I would imagine. Now, the press release sets it out
47:50
Speaker 2: as a privacy positive thing. And I suppose in a
47:53
Speaker 2: limited sense it is because the pub learns less about
47:56
Speaker 2: you than it does from a driving license. On the
47:59
Speaker 2: other hand, the digital ID provider knows you went to
48:02
Speaker 2: the pub that night. And so they begin to track
48:05
Speaker 2: your activities in that sense. Now, the wider point is
48:08
Speaker 2: that a national habit of proving who you are on
48:11
Speaker 2: a phone has now just been given its most sort
48:16
Speaker 2: of everyday use case. And naturally it targets teenagers because
48:20
Speaker 2: that's likely to be the Least friction and convenience is everything, Charles,
48:25
Speaker 2: isn't it?
48:26
Speaker 1: So it seems. Yes.
48:29
Speaker 2: Well, in the meantime, the rollout of live facial recognition
48:32
Speaker 2: builds ever more momentum. So Kent Police have announced they've
48:35
Speaker 2: made 18 arrests over two days in Chatham, 11 of
48:38
Speaker 2: them directly from cameras and seven from officers patrolling nearby.
48:42
Speaker 2: Cheshire ran its third Chester deployment on Saturday, paired with
48:47
Speaker 2: a 48-hour dispersal order. Greater Manchester Police used it at
48:52
Speaker 2: the Derby, where it identified one person out of 17
48:56
Speaker 2: arrests on the day. That's an impressive number.
48:58
Speaker 1: Isn't it? You might say that.
49:02
Speaker 2: Well, maybe we should be asking more about what we're
49:04
Speaker 2: giving up in return for that kind of impressive arrest rate.
49:07
Speaker 2: But Charles, I'm looking forward. forward to the day when
49:10
Speaker 2: we're told about the convictions that have come out of
49:12
Speaker 2: live facial recognition, because so far all the stats are
49:15
Speaker 2: just about arrests. Maybe that's because it takes three years
49:18
Speaker 2: to get anybody into court in the first place.
49:20
Speaker 5: Yeah, but it is a very interesting one because at
49:24
Speaker 5: what point do we arrive where we believe a camera
49:30
Speaker 5: or a computer more than we would a human being?
49:32
Speaker 5: So is this going to go further in terms of
49:36
Speaker 5: positive identification that the technology can be relied upon? above
49:41
Speaker 5: anything else so i mean you know there are so
49:43
Speaker 5: many dangers with this but i think i absolutely think
49:45
Speaker 5: that's that is one of them waiting to happen yes uh.
49:48
Speaker 2: Well now let's uh come on to the story that's
49:51
Speaker 2: been doing the rounds in the news recently and that's eddington.
49:54
Speaker 5: It is i mean completely related to all of this
49:58
Speaker 5: to digital id and um live facial recognition because of
50:01
Speaker 5: course this concerns migration which is the uh hanger upon
50:05
Speaker 5: which the government certainly have been basing many of their
50:08
Speaker 5: plans for some sort of an identity system. But this
50:11
Speaker 5: is a village in Oxfordshire, which has conducted a referendum.
50:16
Speaker 5: And I'm just going to show a clip from GB
50:18
Speaker 5: News from this morning so that you can see what
50:21
Speaker 5: has happened.
50:24
Speaker 7: I am Susanna Pardon. I am the vice chair of
50:27
Speaker 7: the Piddington Parish Council. And I have the privilege today
50:32
Speaker 7: of being the returning officer of for this historic vote
50:37
Speaker 7: that this village held yesterday on the 15th of September, 2026.
50:44
Speaker 7: And the question was, do you support Piddington to secede
50:49
Speaker 7: from the UK and pursue self-determination? I am pleased to
50:56
Speaker 7: announce that last night, following our village meeting, the votes
51:02
Speaker 7: were counted and verified. We had 312 votes counted, which
51:10
Speaker 7: is nearly 92% of the ballot papers issued. And the
51:16
Speaker 7: results are as follows. We had 285 yes votes. We
51:38
Speaker 7: had 26 no votes and we had one ballot paper
51:44
Speaker 7: that was spoiled and will not be included in this count.
51:49
Speaker 7: I am now going to pass to Tim McNally to
51:52
Speaker 7: say a few words. But before I go, I just
51:56
Speaker 7: wanted to say we are Piddington, the village that roars.
52:07
Speaker 5: This has had some coverage for a while, and what
52:09
Speaker 5: it concerns is the plan by the government to put 1,256
52:13
Speaker 5: migrant men into part of Bicester Garrison, which is very,
52:18
Speaker 5: very close to the village of Piddington. So this is
52:22
Speaker 5: the action that they've decided to take, and of course
52:24
Speaker 5: it's been seized upon by the mainstream as an exercise
52:28
Speaker 5: that they can belittle with great zeal. It's been described as.
52:35
Speaker 5: As only being symbolic, although symbolic of quite what is
52:38
Speaker 5: never really emphasised. Now, as far as the government is concerned,
52:41
Speaker 5: it's been subject to an urgent Crown development application. And
52:47
Speaker 5: exactly like Mike's just been saying about the Palantir relationship
52:50
Speaker 5: with NISO, the representation period ran only from the 17th, sorry,
52:55
Speaker 5: from the 7th to the 17th of September. So in
52:58
Speaker 5: other words, it finishes tomorrow. And as I say, this
53:01
Speaker 5: has been treated, in effect, as something as though it's
53:04
Speaker 5: just sort of a lighthearted issue, something that people really, frankly, should,
53:09
Speaker 5: you know, take a little bit of interest in, but
53:11
Speaker 5: nothing more than that. Just to reinforce a point about
53:13
Speaker 5: the passage of information, the Charwell District Council, which is
53:17
Speaker 5: the administrative body for the area, said that the government
53:20
Speaker 5: has announced its proposal to temporarily house up to 1,250
53:24
Speaker 5: single adult males at an alternative accommodation centre at Site
53:28
Speaker 5: A of the former Bicester Garrison site. And then they
53:31
Speaker 5: go on to say that Charwell District Council was not
53:33
Speaker 5: consulted on these plans and was only notified of them
53:36
Speaker 5: hours before they came public knowledge. So this is the
53:39
Speaker 5: sort of disregard with which the government has been treating
53:44
Speaker 5: the public and in particular.
53:45
Speaker 1: The villagers of Piddington.
53:49
Speaker 5: Of course, mainstream media have now descended upon the place
53:52
Speaker 5: and have brought out some legitimate concerns because essentially the
53:56
Speaker 5: position was that there was.
53:57
Speaker 1: Going to be.
53:59
Speaker 5: a problem with having that many men, regardless of where
54:01
Speaker 5: they came from. But of course, now, I think in
54:04
Speaker 5: a legitimate sense, because this has now become an issue
54:08
Speaker 5: that has brought people like Danny Tomo of the Patriot Platform,
54:11
Speaker 5: who we've reported on quite a bit recently, just suggesting
54:15
Speaker 5: that there's actually interference now from a much wider Zionist agenda.
54:20
Speaker 5: And of course, it makes life very difficult for those
54:23
Speaker 5: villages exactly where this will go.
54:26
Speaker 1: Who knows? But significant nonetheless, I think, Mike. Absolutely.
54:32
Speaker 2: Okay, let's move on then to, well, a constitutional issue, Charles,
54:36
Speaker 2: because Andy Burnham has made a written statement to the
54:41
Speaker 2: House on the 10th of September saying that restrictions in
54:47
Speaker 2: the Roman Catholic Relief Act 1829 and the Jews Relief
54:51
Speaker 2: Act 1858, which prevent Catholics and Jews from advising the
54:56
Speaker 2: sovereign on appointments to the Church of England, and the
54:59
Speaker 2: Church of Scotland are going to be removed. We just
55:02
Speaker 2: bring this on screen. This is the independent Catholic News
55:04
Speaker 2: coverage of it. So he unilaterally announced they had transferred
55:10
Speaker 2: that responsibility to the Lord Chancellor instead. He said that
55:14
Speaker 2: a bill would follow to correct what he called an
55:16
Speaker 2: antiquated and archaic anomaly. The bill itself is called the
55:21
Speaker 2: Church Appointments Brackets Repeal of Discriminatory Provision Bill, and it
55:25
Speaker 2: was presented yesterday by Louise Haye. to who's chancellor of
55:29
Speaker 2: the Duchy of Lancaster. And so this is the first
55:33
Speaker 2: bill of Burnham's government, the very first thing that he's done.
55:37
Speaker 2: And it targets the specific clauses in those two acts.
55:41
Speaker 2: But the question is why now? Well, undoubtedly it's because
55:43
Speaker 2: Burnham is a Catholic himself and he clearly couldn't be
55:47
Speaker 2: seen as only bringing forward legislation that lifts the restriction
55:50
Speaker 2: on Catholics and leaves the restriction on Jews. But the
55:55
Speaker 2: National Secular Society claimed credit for this being done because
55:58
Speaker 2: they had written to the cabinet office in August, calling
56:02
Speaker 2: for an end to the ban, arguing that it was
56:04
Speaker 2: rooted in historical anti-Catholicism and anti-Semitism and was hard to justify.
56:10
Speaker 1: In a modern liberal democracy.
56:11
Speaker 2: Now, of course, they welcomed the legislation, but they want
56:14
Speaker 2: to see the job finished, so to speak, with the
56:17
Speaker 2: complete separation of church and state. The only real criticism
56:21
Speaker 2: of the bill so far has come from Jacob Rees-Mogg,
56:23
Speaker 2: who argued that it's entirely sensible that Catholics and Jews
56:27
Speaker 2: may not make Church of England appointments because it's the
56:30
Speaker 2: established church and that ministers should in fact take power
56:34
Speaker 2: back from the current committee, but it should be restricted
56:37
Speaker 2: to Anglican ministers only. And he concluded by saying that
56:41
Speaker 2: if the law changes, it should be narrowed to Anglicans
56:44
Speaker 2: only and that the existing position is not a grave injustice.
56:48
Speaker 2: It's just common sense. Now, just before I get to
56:51
Speaker 2: your thoughts on this, Charles, I just wanted to read what,
56:53
Speaker 2: I asked Alex Thompson what his thoughts were on this earlier.
56:57
Speaker 2: And he said, well, it's the first time he's aware
57:00
Speaker 2: of that HMG has described the constitution as outdated. And
57:03
Speaker 2: then point two here was, when will Anglicans get to
57:07
Speaker 2: appoint the Roman Catholic Bishop of Westminster or the Board
57:11
Speaker 2: of Deputies of British Jews? So it doesn't work in
57:13
Speaker 2: that direction, in other words. And then he said that
57:16
Speaker 2: MPs shirked their responsibilities to oversee Church of England government
57:21
Speaker 2: a century ago, which caused the setting up of the
57:23
Speaker 2: self-governing Church Assembly in 1919, now known as the General Synod,
57:28
Speaker 2: with only Episcopal appointments kept outside the scope of Church
57:31
Speaker 2: of England self-government. HMG exploits this to keep Church of
57:37
Speaker 2: England nominally established while pretending that Episcopal appointments are a
57:41
Speaker 2: royal prerogative. on prime ministerial advice. This ensures the Church
57:46
Speaker 2: of England bishops, with their social clout and airtime, are
57:49
Speaker 2: government compliant. And I think that is the key point,
57:53
Speaker 2: isn't it?
57:54
Speaker 1: Completely the key point. Yeah, absolutely. Alex, on the button
57:58
Speaker 1: as usual. As usual, yes. And seemingly in agreement with
58:02
Speaker 1: the MOG.
58:04
Speaker 2: But let's finish then today with the Falklands, Charles.
58:06
Speaker 1: Yeah, we will.
58:08
Speaker 5: Because this has been in the news for some time,
58:11
Speaker 5: but specifically the point that I want to deal with
58:14
Speaker 5: goes back to what might be described as the fallout
58:16
Speaker 5: from Edmund Aban's speech last week, apparently on Israel and
58:20
Speaker 5: Palestine and the extraordinarily weak sanctions regime that he talked
58:23
Speaker 5: about implementing at some point during the next six to
58:26
Speaker 5: nine months. But in response to that, one of the
58:28
Speaker 5: people that couldn't resist tweeting about it was the the
58:33
Speaker 5: Israeli minister, Itamar Ben-Gavir. And what he said was that
58:38
Speaker 5: it's time for the state of Israel to publicly recognize
58:41
Speaker 5: that the Malvinas Islands are Argentine territory under occupation, which
58:46
Speaker 5: the British violently steal from the Argentine people. So I
58:50
Speaker 5: don't know whether he's been using chat GPT or what.
58:52
Speaker 5: But anyway, he went on to say, the British are
58:55
Speaker 5: not content with merely occupying the territory. They also carry
58:58
Speaker 5: out oil drilling there. and steal the money from the
59:02
Speaker 5: Argentine people. I call upon Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to
59:06
Speaker 5: recognise Argentina's sovereignty over the Malvinas Islands and to impose
59:10
Speaker 5: sanctions on Great Britain as long as the occupation continues.
59:14
Speaker 5: The childishness to one side, I thought in particular, the
59:19
Speaker 5: oil drilling was of interest. And it turns out that
59:22
Speaker 5: in fact, it is as reported here by Reuters, somewhat confusingly,
59:26
Speaker 5: Israeli investors in crosshairs of Argentina's Millet over Falklands oil project.
59:30
Speaker 5: So what exactly does this mean? Well, we're talking really
59:34
Speaker 5: about the exploration in Falkland that's going on at the minute.
59:38
Speaker 5: And that is considerable. There's obviously a bit of B-roll
59:41
Speaker 5: footage running now. And this concerns the Sea Lion project.
59:46
Speaker 5: And that's run in large part by Navitas Petroleum, which has,
59:51
Speaker 5: as you can see in the top right there, a
59:54
Speaker 5: 65% working interest in it. And what Ben-Gavir seemed not
59:58
Speaker 5: to know was that Navitas is, of course, an Israeli company.
1:00:02
Speaker 5: And operating 65% of the Sea Lion project. The other
1:00:07
Speaker 5: part of it is taken by Rockhopper Exploration, essentially a
1:00:11
Speaker 5: British company, but listed in the substantial shareholders are the
1:00:16
Speaker 5: top five, three of which are Israeli. So I just
1:00:20
Speaker 5: thought it was worth pointing out that extraordinary bit of
1:00:23
Speaker 5: presumably accidental hypocrisy, but one never knows these days.
1:00:27
Speaker 1: No, absolutely.
1:00:28
Speaker 2: Absolutely. Thank you, Charles. Thank you, Vanessa. We've got to
1:00:31
Speaker 2: leave it there for today. Now, we've got to say
1:00:33
Speaker 2: this weekend is a big one and the programme begins
1:00:38
Speaker 2: on Friday for our on-location event here in Plymouth. So
1:00:42
Speaker 2: there will be no UK column news on Friday. We'll
1:00:45
Speaker 2: be back for the news on Monday at 1pm as usual.
1:00:48
Speaker 2: But we will still have material going out tomorrow at
1:00:51
Speaker 2: 1pm and on Friday at 1pm if you want to
1:00:54
Speaker 2: be part of that. But I would encourage you actually
1:00:57
Speaker 2: to forget about that and instead get a ticket for
1:01:00
Speaker 2: the live stream and join us live on Friday afternoon.
1:01:04
Speaker 2: That would be a much better.
1:01:05
Speaker 1: Idea, wouldn't it? It absolutely would. Yes, please do.
1:01:08
Speaker 2: Yeah.
1:01:08
Speaker 1: Okay.
1:01:08
Speaker 2: Well, thanks everyone for joining us today. We'll see you
1:01:11
Speaker 2: for extra if you UK column member in a few minutes. Otherwise,
1:01:14
Speaker 2: as I say, Monday at 1pm.
1:01:17
Speaker 1: See you then. Bye-bye. Bye-bye.