Latest / UK Column Radio / UK Column News — 23rd September 2026

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UK Column News — 23rd September 2026 · UK Column Radio

0:08
Speaker 1: Good afternoon.
0:09
Speaker 2: It's Wednesday, the 23rd of September, 2026, just after one o'clock.
0:12
Speaker 2: Welcome to UK Column News. I'm your host, Mike Robinson.
0:15
Speaker 2: Joining me by video link today are Charles Mallett and
0:18
Speaker 2: Vanessa Bealey. Welcome to the programme both. Now later in
0:21
Speaker 2: the programme, we'll have a report on Climate Week and
0:23
Speaker 2: the latest on the surveillance war here in the UK
0:26
Speaker 2: and in fact in other countries as well. But we're
0:28
Speaker 2: going to be focusing quite a bit today on the
0:30
Speaker 2: United Nations General Assembly. And of course, we're going to
0:34
Speaker 2: start with Britain's latest Prime Minister, Andy Burnham. Now, he
0:38
Speaker 2: gave his first address to the General Assembly yesterday, his
0:41
Speaker 2: first ever. It came hours after he had met Donald
0:45
Speaker 2: Trump for the first time. And he framed it as
0:48
Speaker 2: a post-Brexit reset. He told delegates that 10 years on
0:51
Speaker 2: from the referendum, Britain is back. He pitched the UK
0:55
Speaker 2: as an honest broker, able to bridge the US, the EU, China,
0:59
Speaker 2: and emerging powers such as India and Brazil. So he
1:02
Speaker 2: is positioning the United Kingdom as being some kind of
1:05
Speaker 2: arbiter of peace in the world. We'll come on to
1:08
Speaker 2: that much later in the program. But he also continued
1:12
Speaker 2: to replace that we would provide continued defense spending and
1:17
Speaker 2: that NATO would receive all the commitments that it's had
1:20
Speaker 2: from the British government and He accused Russia of an
1:24
Speaker 2: industrial-scale information campaign against Britain using bots, fake websites, forged branding.
1:30
Speaker 2: He said, in fact, there was forged branding of 28
1:32
Speaker 2: British organizations, including the BBC. He said that Russia was
1:37
Speaker 2: amplifying far-right narratives and attempted interference in the 2019 general election. Now,
1:43
Speaker 2: Burnham's rhetoric over this was amplified by Britain's Secretary of
1:47
Speaker 2: State for War, Wes Streeting, on the BBC Radio 4 podcast.
1:50
Speaker 2: Day programme this morning. Let's just have a listen to that.
1:56
Speaker 3: Well, what we know of Russian intent is that they
1:59
Speaker 3: already pose sub-threshold threats and hybrid threats to this country.
2:07
Speaker 3: Russia does not take action that constitutes war against this country,
2:12
Speaker 3: but it does pose a material threat. And we see
2:15
Speaker 3: that threat manifest itself in a variety of ways, some
2:18
Speaker 3: of which the public can readily see from some of
2:22
Speaker 3: the performative exercises we've seen in the channel, as well
2:25
Speaker 3: as the mapping of underwater cables that the public are
2:28
Speaker 3: aware of. The public also saw and was outraged by
2:32
Speaker 3: the poisonings that took place in Salisbury. So we know
2:35
Speaker 3: what Russian intent and capability is, but the information domain
2:42
Speaker 3: is one that we need to be as vigilant about
2:45
Speaker 3: as every other one of our bits of critical national infrastructure.
2:50
Speaker 2: So the information domain is now being placed as an
2:54
Speaker 2: item of critical national infrastructure. And this is vastly important.
2:59
Speaker 2: We'll talk about this much more in extra. But of course,
3:02
Speaker 2: this is continuing the rhetoric that has been on Russia
3:06
Speaker 2: for the last 10, 15 years. It includes integrity initiative.
3:10
Speaker 2: And of course, he mentioned Skripal affair there, the poisonings
3:13
Speaker 2: in Salisbury. Now, if anybody isn't familiar with those, if
3:17
Speaker 2: you get onto the UK column website, use the search
3:19
Speaker 2: button and, uh, type in the word Skripal, you'll get
3:22
Speaker 2: a number of articles and videos that are very important
3:26
Speaker 2: to this. That'll give you the background. But coming back
3:30
Speaker 2: to Burnham, he put Kremlin spending on information manipulation at
3:34
Speaker 2: around £ 1. 3 billion a year and announced a new National
3:38
Speaker 2: Centre for Information Defence to detect and disrupt state-backed attacks.
3:43
Speaker 2: He tied vulnerability to disinformation to the cost of living
3:47
Speaker 2: and youth unemployment. The It's amazing what this information is
3:51
Speaker 2: capable of doing. And he announced a 10-year plan for Britain,
3:55
Speaker 2: which is going to come out later this year. And
3:57
Speaker 2: on Ukraine, he said that, and of course, this is
3:59
Speaker 2: following on from his visit to Kiev last month, Burnham
4:03
Speaker 2: promised to help with air defense and repairs to heat
4:06
Speaker 2: and power plants before the winter. And he called on
4:09
Speaker 2: Russian strikes and civilian infrastructure. He alleged Russian strikes and
4:13
Speaker 2: civilian infrastructure. He called those war crimes. And he urged
4:16
Speaker 2: Moscow to accept a ceasefire. He went on to talk
4:19
Speaker 2: about the Falklands and the right to remain British. On
4:22
Speaker 2: the Middle East, he condemned Hamas and stood with Israel
4:25
Speaker 2: against Iran. We'll see that in a second. But he
4:27
Speaker 2: criticized Israeli actions in Gaza and the West Bank, and
4:31
Speaker 2: he opposed the E1 settlement. And he cited UK measures,
4:36
Speaker 2: so a ban on trade and goods with illegal settlements, which,
4:39
Speaker 2: as we know, is just PR, but also recognizing that
4:43
Speaker 2: the occupation is unlawful and settlement. And he the placement
4:48
Speaker 2: of sanctions on settlement builders. So as we say, he
4:52
Speaker 2: stands with Israel. Let's just have a listen to that,
4:54
Speaker 2: and then I'm very keen to get Vanessa's comments.
4:56
Speaker 4: We continue to condemn Hamas, and we stand with Israel
5:02
Speaker 4: in the face of the ongoing threats, including from Iran
5:06
Speaker 4: against Israel and Jewish people around the world. But this
5:10
Speaker 4: does not justify the Israeli government's actions in Gaza or
5:15
Speaker 4: the West Bank.
5:18
Speaker 2: So Vanessa, let me welcome you to the programme. What
5:21
Speaker 2: are your thoughts on this? Because he's not the only
5:24
Speaker 2: one that's sort of taking this position.
5:27
Speaker 5: No, but the British government is entirely complicit in Israel's
5:32
Speaker 5: actions in Gaza and in the West Bank. So for me,
5:35
Speaker 5: this is performative. Still leading with, I stand with Israel.
5:42
Speaker 5: but I condemn X, Y, Z is effectively meaningless. And
5:46
Speaker 5: the fact that the majority of regional and even European
5:52
Speaker 5: and UK world leaders were making these points suggests to
5:56
Speaker 5: me that this is just virtue signaling prior to an
5:59
Speaker 5: escalation from Israel. This is my reading of it.
6:04
Speaker 2: Thank you for that. Now, the other thing that he
6:06
Speaker 2: did was he reinforced the idea that Britain and the
6:09
Speaker 2: United States are allies. So let's just have a look
6:12
Speaker 2: at this clip and let's see what he said.
6:17
Speaker 4: This forward. We are America's closest ally. We have deep
6:23
Speaker 4: ties with our friends in the European Union and seek
6:27
Speaker 4: to deepen them further.
6:32
Speaker 2: So what are your thoughts on the US ally point, Vanessa? Well,
6:40
Speaker 2: are they?
6:40
Speaker 5: I mean, I thought Farage was the, you know, spokesperson
6:46
Speaker 5: for the UK as far as Trump is concerned.
6:50
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, this is a very good point. But anyway,
6:53
Speaker 2: he went on to say that Britain aims to take
6:55
Speaker 2: on a new role in the world. We've mentioned that,
6:57
Speaker 2: to bring people together. And we'll be talking about that
7:00
Speaker 2: and extra as well. on Friday's program. Sorry, we'll talk
7:06
Speaker 2: about that on Friday's program as well. Now, AI was
7:08
Speaker 2: the main part of his speech. Burnham praised its potential
7:12
Speaker 2: on cancer care, education, and growth, but he called it
7:15
Speaker 2: a multiplier of risk because, of course, they are doubling
7:19
Speaker 2: down on this notion that it is some kind of
7:21
Speaker 2: existential threat to the world. And in fact, Wes Streeting
7:26
Speaker 2: on Radio 4 this morning was calling it a potential
7:29
Speaker 2: weapon of mass destruction. But let's hear a little of
7:32
Speaker 2: what Barnum said.
7:35
Speaker 4: I am announcing today that we are developing a new
7:39
Speaker 4: AI defence partnership with the United States to protect our
7:43
Speaker 4: critical national infrastructure. But we know that AI will also
7:49
Speaker 4: be a source of disruption to the way we live
7:52
Speaker 4: and work, a multiplier of risk. We've all heard the warnings,
7:58
Speaker 4: which we must heed. I know how worried people are,
8:02
Speaker 4: so we have to rise to this moment. Fundamental decisions
8:06
Speaker 4: on this technology are too important to be left to chance.
8:11
Speaker 4: They must be taken by elected governments who serve working people.
8:17
Speaker 4: And we need to give people the support they need
8:19
Speaker 4: through this change, ensuring that it becomes an engine for
8:23
Speaker 4: re-industrialisation and opportunity as well. There is a lesson from
8:29
Speaker 4: the first industrial revolution, which started in Northern England two
8:33
Speaker 4: centuries ago. It was a time of incredible technological progress.
8:39
Speaker 4: But for workers, the disruption brought huge suffering and exploitation.
8:44
Speaker 4: Things got a lot worse before they got better. So
8:48
Speaker 4: this time, we need to get it right. I believe
8:52
Speaker 4: we're more than equal to the task. The UK has
8:56
Speaker 4: some of the best tech and AI talent anywhere in
8:59
Speaker 4: the world. And when it comes to guarding against the risks,
9:02
Speaker 4: we have our world-leading AI Security Institute working hand in
9:08
Speaker 4: glove with the US and the leading labs on AI safety.
9:13
Speaker 4: But we need to go further. Building on the meeting
9:18
Speaker 4: convened by His Majesty King Charles last week, I can
9:22
Speaker 4: announce today that I am going to put AI at
9:26
Speaker 4: the heart of the UK's G20 presidency next year. I
9:32
Speaker 4: look back at how we responded to the financial crisis
9:35
Speaker 4: back in 2008.
9:36
Speaker 2: Okay, so he's attempting to suggest that this is a
9:42
Speaker 2: crisis along the lines of what happened in 2008, as
9:44
Speaker 2: he said. G20 presidency next year, he's going to bring this,
9:50
Speaker 2: make it central tenet of that. He's talking about a
9:52
Speaker 2: single set of global principles and standards. He's talking about
9:56
Speaker 2: willingness to legislate if necessary. And these announcements were in contrast.
10:00
Speaker 2: Vanessa will be talking about Trump later on in the program.
10:03
Speaker 2: But these were in contrast with Trump, who told the
10:06
Speaker 2: same assembly that the US rejects any, quote, globalist scheme
10:10
Speaker 2: to regulate AI. Now, he also discussed climate change as
10:14
Speaker 2: a national security threat. He talked about the conflict in Sudan.
10:18
Speaker 2: talked about the renewal of the United Nations, and he
10:20
Speaker 2: talked about his number 10 North office in Manchester, which
10:25
Speaker 2: he illustrated with the story of Manchester mill workers boycotting
10:28
Speaker 2: slave-picked cotton in 1862.
10:31
Speaker 1: So it's well worth watching.
10:33
Speaker 2: I see in the chat box some people saying I've
10:35
Speaker 2: got burning fatigue already, but it is well worth watching
10:38
Speaker 2: the whole speech just for the comedy value alone. But Charles,
10:41
Speaker 2: I've just mentioned, he mentioned food and farming and so on.
10:46
Speaker 2: that seems to be a running theme at the General
10:50
Speaker 2: Assembly this year.
10:51
Speaker 6: It does.
10:54
Speaker 7: I mean, not just at the General Assembly. And just
10:57
Speaker 7: to go back to what you were saying, it looks
11:00
Speaker 7: to me like he's been talking about an awful lot
11:02
Speaker 7: of things, most of which he doesn't understand. And I
11:04
Speaker 7: think we can have a much wider discussion about his remarks,
11:06
Speaker 7: particularly on AI in Extra, because I don't think he
11:09
Speaker 7: has the first idea he's talking about that it's also
11:12
Speaker 7: interesting to note that there were not really very many
11:14
Speaker 7: people listening to what he did have to say but
11:16
Speaker 7: exactly as you say a critical part of this uh
11:19
Speaker 7: of this assembly is the climate summit and there is
11:23
Speaker 7: today a high level event although high level of what
11:27
Speaker 7: is not made quite clear uh this is for climate
11:31
Speaker 7: action and the dress sorry the just transition and again
11:36
Speaker 7: um calling these words into question what exactly is just
11:41
Speaker 7: about it. But on the specific page, this is all
11:45
Speaker 7: predicated on the idea, and I quote, the climate crisis
11:50
Speaker 7: has entered a new phase, I put that in bold,
11:53
Speaker 7: they didn't, in which overshoot is now inevitable while the
11:58
Speaker 7: energy transition is accelerates. And this, in effect, is just
12:02
Speaker 7: a different way of putting into words exactly the same
12:05
Speaker 7: message that's being repeated around the houses again and again
12:09
Speaker 7: and again. And just in case you're not clear, overshoot
12:11
Speaker 7: is the idea that the mean, sorry, I can find
12:16
Speaker 7: trouble getting this one out, the mean global temperature due
12:19
Speaker 7: to anthropogenic activity will raise by one and a half degrees,
12:23
Speaker 7: and that's deemed sort of acceptable, but overshoot is anything
12:26
Speaker 7: beyond that. Now, In addition to that, or as part
12:29
Speaker 7: of the sort of warm-up act, the now Foreign Secretary
12:32
Speaker 7: Ed Miliband was at the NYC, Climate Week NYC. Now,
12:38
Speaker 7: obviously very much associated, and presumably he was able to
12:41
Speaker 7: draw on his vast experience at the Department for Energy
12:44
Speaker 7: Security and Net Zero. Anyway, he was asked to give
12:47
Speaker 7: the opening address there. And I'm just going to play
12:49
Speaker 7: the very first bit of it, because... I don't think
12:53
Speaker 7: the word underwhelming gives it quite the description that it deserves.
12:57
Speaker 1: So let's just have a look at this.
13:00
Speaker 7: My Honourable Ed Miliband, Foreign Secretary for the UK.
13:20
Speaker 4: Great.
13:20
Speaker 8: Well, look, thank you so much, Helen. And it's really
13:23
Speaker 8: fantastic to be back at New York Climate Week. I
13:26
Speaker 8: can honestly say to you, this is my second favorite
13:30
Speaker 8: climate week in the world.
13:32
Speaker 9: After London, of course.
13:35
Speaker 8: No, it's fantastic to be here. And look, I think
13:39
Speaker 8: the first thing I want to say is sound a
13:41
Speaker 8: note of optimism. Because despite challenging political times, It's set
13:48
Speaker 8: to be the case that in 2026, we're going to
13:51
Speaker 8: see $ 2. 2 trillion invested in clean energy against $ 1. 2 trillion
13:56
Speaker 8: in fossil fuels. I think that deserves a round of applause,
13:58
Speaker 8: ladies and gentlemen, for yourselves, apart from anything else.
14:05
Speaker 7: I don't know if he writes his own jokes, but
14:07
Speaker 7: I'm not sure that one went down particularly well. It's
14:09
Speaker 7: also worth noting that the UK column is able to
14:12
Speaker 7: fill an event, but apparently not.
14:14
Speaker 1: Climate Week, NYC.
14:15
Speaker 7: Now, he is rightly focusing on the trillions of pounds
14:20
Speaker 7: or dollars sloshing about because, in effect, nothing else is
14:25
Speaker 7: actually happening. And whilst he does focus on the money,
14:28
Speaker 7: I would like to look at these graphs from the NOAA,
14:33
Speaker 7: the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, because there is absolutely
14:36
Speaker 7: no getting away from the fact that when you examine
14:38
Speaker 7: the levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide, and this is done
14:41
Speaker 7: month by month by month, so the red line there
14:44
Speaker 7: is indicating that the carbon dioxide is going steeply down,
14:47
Speaker 7: followed by steeply up. And this pattern repeats. Now, that's
14:50
Speaker 7: only five years worth. So just in case there's any
14:52
Speaker 7: doubt about the matter, that goes all the way back
14:55
Speaker 7: to 1980. Now, If somebody can explain how anthropogenic activity
15:00
Speaker 7: is causing exactly that shape of a graph, please send
15:03
Speaker 7: your working in on the back of a cigarette packet. Now,
15:07
Speaker 7: this coincides with the latest round of SFI activities or
15:13
Speaker 7: payments from the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.
15:17
Speaker 7: So they're headlining with a 233 million fund to help
15:19
Speaker 7: more farmers boost agriculture. production and protect the land what
15:24
Speaker 7: do they actually mean by that and where is the
15:25
Speaker 7: focus this is to help farmers hit by low yields
15:28
Speaker 7: and rising costs to access a reliable income stream in
15:32
Speaker 7: return for action to improve the environment now you see
15:36
Speaker 7: the transactional nature of that in effect this is exactly
15:39
Speaker 7: julian rose's point subsidy creates slaves and they are aiming
15:42
Speaker 7: to create a dependence and an absolute focus on the
15:46
Speaker 7: environment and of course there is a minimum threshold of
15:48
Speaker 7: three hectares so any land holding under that is not eligible.
15:52
Speaker 7: The point is that there shouldn't be an exclusivity in
15:56
Speaker 7: mutual terms between being able to produce food and improve
16:00
Speaker 7: the environment but of course this is exactly what they
16:02
Speaker 7: are suggesting is going to happen and the recent data
16:05
Speaker 7: suggests that there's really only under £ 10, 000 going to farms.
16:10
Speaker 7: Now I've just done a back of the envelope sort
16:13
Speaker 7: of calculation here, which would be the equivalent of doctor
16:16
Speaker 7: having injected 430 vulnerable children with the COVID jab at £ 22. 58
16:21
Speaker 7: a pop. And I will come back to explaining exactly
16:25
Speaker 7: why that is. But really, the message from this is
16:27
Speaker 7: the government is saying to those who are currently doing so,
16:30
Speaker 7: stop farming, or at least that's what it looks like. Now,
16:34
Speaker 7: We go on to have a look at where the
16:36
Speaker 7: taxpayer money goes, because the environment budget, which is in
16:40
Speaker 7: effect part of the activities that are going on to
16:44
Speaker 7: one side of this, has now reached 19.2 billion. And
16:47
Speaker 7: I set that in context. The farming budget is still
16:49
Speaker 7: only 3.7 billion.
16:50
Speaker 1: And this is... only really to the average taxpayer.
16:57
Speaker 7: And of course, it's a very crude sum, but an
16:59
Speaker 7: average payment of, say, £ 90 a year from the 41
17:03
Speaker 7: million taxpayers for farming. Now, I'm going to set that
17:07
Speaker 7: further in context. But of course, the message here, again,
17:09
Speaker 7: is stop farming. And those are the environment and farming budgets, which,
17:14
Speaker 7: of course, are absolutely dwarfed, not just by the defence budget,
17:17
Speaker 7: but Ukraine receives almost the same amount as farming. And
17:22
Speaker 7: this is one of the points that's made. It's as
17:24
Speaker 7: though farming has such a minute contribution to the economy
17:29
Speaker 7: that it doesn't really deserve to be paid back. But
17:31
Speaker 7: of course, this is not really to look at all
17:34
Speaker 7: the figures.
17:35
Speaker 1: It should be.
17:36
Speaker 7: But what I really want to do, if we can
17:37
Speaker 7: just put that back on screen now, is see how
17:39
Speaker 7: it is absolutely dwarfed by the £ 277 billion that goes
17:43
Speaker 7: to the National Health Service. And the point there really
17:47
Speaker 7: is to suggest that There would be no need for
17:50
Speaker 7: such an enormous budget if the food, first of all,
17:53
Speaker 7: was produced in this country and was of the right type. Now,
17:57
Speaker 7: this is this is also coincided with the government putting
18:00
Speaker 7: out the farming evidence pack, which is, again, there we go.
18:03
Speaker 1: High level, high level overview of the UK agricultural economy. industry.
18:08
Speaker 7: And just a few statistics to pull out of that,
18:11
Speaker 7: because it's very clear that in terms of productivity, 66%
18:15
Speaker 7: of the value of the UK's production comes from livestock,
18:18
Speaker 7: of which dairy and beef are the largest sectors. Now,
18:20
Speaker 7: of course, that's problematic, because the agenda absolutely indicates that
18:25
Speaker 7: that is not the right way to go, and we'll
18:27
Speaker 7: come on to that in just a sec. And also,
18:30
Speaker 7: the other thing is to point out that the age
18:33
Speaker 7: trend is very much still weighted towards older people being
18:38
Speaker 7: involved in farming. And of course, with all these disincentives
18:41
Speaker 7: and ways in which people are pushed off the land
18:43
Speaker 7: in which there's very little help for people who are
18:45
Speaker 7: operating on a smaller scale, it is easy to see
18:48
Speaker 7: how further and further inroads are basically made into pushing
18:52
Speaker 7: people off the land. And finally, from this evidence pack,
18:56
Speaker 7: just the very, very flimsy bit of evidence to suggest
19:00
Speaker 7: that emissions in farming are the problem. And I'd just
19:03
Speaker 7: like to point out that it's probably difficult to see,
19:06
Speaker 7: but the third bar down is carbon dioxide, which shows
19:09
Speaker 7: that 2% of overall carbon dioxide emissions from the But
19:19
Speaker 7: of course, if it weren't for methane, where there's in
19:21
Speaker 7: effect a confected panic about that, it would be very
19:23
Speaker 7: difficult to argue the point. Again, something that's never concentrated on.
19:28
Speaker 7: But where this ends up, and this is the reason
19:30
Speaker 7: I talked about the COVID jabs in the first place,
19:31
Speaker 7: is it leads directly back into what are effectively mandates.
19:35
Speaker 7: So these are the Scottish dietary goals, and these are
19:37
Speaker 7: all based on this climate and environmental argument.
19:41
Speaker 1: But it's a diktat.
19:43
Speaker 7: It sees a reduction in calorie intake by 120 calories
19:46
Speaker 7: per person per day all they're suggesting, more than suggesting,
19:52
Speaker 7: the average intake of red meat is pegged at around
19:55
Speaker 7: 70 grams per person per day. And finally, an insistence
19:59
Speaker 7: that the average intake of total fat to reduce to
20:02
Speaker 7: no more than 35% of food energy.
20:03
Speaker 1: So this is.
20:06
Speaker 7: In effect, the justification, going back to where Miliband started,
20:08
Speaker 7: where the General Assembly started, this is what is leading
20:11
Speaker 7: to the justification of interference in the lives of citizens
20:15
Speaker 7: to this degree, where they're actually aiming to dictate exactly
20:19
Speaker 7: what it is that you eat and you haven't voted
20:22
Speaker 7: for any of it.
20:24
Speaker 6: Indeed.
20:24
Speaker 2: Thank you, Charles. We'll be coming back to the UNGA
20:27
Speaker 2: later on. But in the meantime, I just want to
20:29
Speaker 2: move on to this because, of course, as most people
20:33
Speaker 2: will know by now, We were delighted to have Professor
20:37
Speaker 2: Sushrit Bhakti joining us for our 20th anniversary on location
20:43
Speaker 2: event on Monday. Of course, everybody will know Sushrit very well.
20:48
Speaker 2: He's a very significant role in pulling the lid off
20:53
Speaker 2: many of the COVID lies during the past five years.
20:59
Speaker 2: And I just wanted to highlight this because his presentation
21:02
Speaker 2: from that event is now available for everybody on the
21:06
Speaker 2: front page of the UK column website. Now, I'll just
21:09
Speaker 2: run through what he talks about in this because he
21:11
Speaker 2: talks about his life, his career, his childhood in Bern
21:14
Speaker 2: and Cairo and Bangkok, his medical training in Bonn, and
21:18
Speaker 2: his research at the Max Planck Institute of Immunobiology. And
21:22
Speaker 2: he describes how the corona years led him to Gustave
21:26
Speaker 2: Le Bon's work on crowd psychology and that caused him
21:31
Speaker 2: to question decades of his own teachings.
21:33
Speaker 1: Vaccination.
21:34
Speaker 2: Now, he presented a new hypothesis, which is that mRNA
21:39
Speaker 2: is taken up in the body in such a way
21:43
Speaker 2: that it causes the production of foreign proteins, in this case,
21:47
Speaker 2: the spike protein. But he said that any other protein
21:50
Speaker 2: would have the same effect, and that that leads to
21:53
Speaker 2: disruptions to the blood supply and death of surrounding cells. Now,
21:58
Speaker 2: I'm not going to try to pronounce some of the
22:00
Speaker 2: more technical words in this, but I absolutely strongly recommend
22:05
Speaker 2: that everybody watches this and please do share it if
22:07
Speaker 2: you possibly can, because what he's talking about is that
22:11
Speaker 2: the effect of this is disturbances in nerve conduction and
22:15
Speaker 2: the symptoms characteristic of classic degenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's,
22:20
Speaker 2: multiple sclerosis, Parkinson's and many others. And these, he says,
22:23
Speaker 2: are symptoms which you observe in vaccine injured individuals. And
22:29
Speaker 2: so he says that this causes activation of the complement system,
22:33
Speaker 2: which is part of the immune system. And therefore, the
22:38
Speaker 2: body effectively comes under attack from the complement system itself.
22:42
Speaker 2: So he also suggests in this a potential solution to
22:47
Speaker 2: the problem. Now, he made it very clear in his
22:50
Speaker 2: presentation that he considers this still under development, still under development,
23:00
Speaker 2: and therefore he is challenging the medical profession to prove
23:04
Speaker 2: him wrong. And, well, Charles, I don't know if you've
23:08
Speaker 2: got any thoughts on Sushit's presentation. It was fantastic. It
23:12
Speaker 2: was very well received by the audience. In fact, many
23:15
Speaker 2: people were very surprised to see him there. But I
23:19
Speaker 2: think what he announced was absolutely important.
23:26
Speaker 1: I completely agree.
23:26
Speaker 7: I think the consequences and the ramifications of what he
23:29
Speaker 7: was talking about are extremely profound. But I think the
23:33
Speaker 7: bit that I would like to talk about really is
23:35
Speaker 7: the humanity that he brought.
23:38
Speaker 1: And he spoke for some.
23:42
Speaker 1: Considerable period of time.
23:43
Speaker 7: And I think, first of all, actually, because he wasn't announced,
23:46
Speaker 7: he wasn't part of the programme, we should note that
23:48
Speaker 7: there was an audible gasp of not just surprise, but
23:51
Speaker 7: also delight and excitement when his presence was announced. And
23:55
Speaker 7: I think that absolutely should be recognised and celebrated. And
23:59
Speaker 7: I think that was really what shone through everything that
24:02
Speaker 7: he had to say, he was driven by exactly the
24:05
Speaker 7: right motives. And obviously, when that combines with him having
24:08
Speaker 7: the tremendous brain and capability that he does, we really
24:11
Speaker 7: were witnessing something very special. So yes, I would absolutely echo,
24:14
Speaker 7: please do go and watch it.
24:16
Speaker 2: And please do share it.
24:17
Speaker 1: It is important.
24:18
Speaker 2: And we're delighted that he chose to announce this at
24:21
Speaker 2: our event. That was a real privilege for us as well. Now, just...
24:25
Speaker 2: Remind everybody that we do need your ongoing support if
24:28
Speaker 2: you do like what we do. So head over to
24:31
Speaker 2: the UK column website for more on that. Various ways
24:35
Speaker 2: you can support us. You can make a donation. You
24:37
Speaker 2: can join us on a membership. There are monthly, annual,
24:40
Speaker 2: and lifetime options there. This is what keeps us going.
24:45
Speaker 2: We do, of course, have the third edition of the column,
24:48
Speaker 2: our quarterly magazine that is available on the shop at
24:52
Speaker 2: the moment. Issues one and two are still there. If
24:55
Speaker 2: you'd like to pick those up now, I just need
24:58
Speaker 2: to mention that Jeremy and Carl are not producing content
25:02
Speaker 2: at the moment because they are both traveling on their
25:04
Speaker 2: way back home from our event. So we'll be back
25:08
Speaker 2: to normal next week with stuff from them. But let's
25:13
Speaker 2: move on then to privacy, data protection, these types of issues,
25:17
Speaker 2: because I just want to start off here with the
25:19
Speaker 2: Investigatory Powers Tribunal, which sat on the 17th of September.
25:24
Speaker 2: for a case management hearing on Apple's second challenge to
25:27
Speaker 2: the British Home Office. The argument that day was not
25:31
Speaker 2: about whether the government can demand access to encrypted iCloud
25:35
Speaker 2: data or not. It was about whether the government can
25:39
Speaker 2: keep refusing to confirm or deny that it asked at all. Now,
25:46
Speaker 2: one of the lawyers in the room on the day
25:48
Speaker 2: called the government's position absolutely farcical. Now, just to remind you,
25:52
Speaker 2: this is all about the ongoing fight between Apple and
25:55
Speaker 2: the British regime over advanced data protection. This is their
25:58
Speaker 2: capability for people to be able to encrypt anything that
26:02
Speaker 2: they store on Apple's iCloud platform. Now, if you remember
26:07
Speaker 2: under the latest iteration of the investigatory parse claimed by
26:11
Speaker 2: the Starmer government before Burnham, the demand was that Apple
26:15
Speaker 2: provide a backdoor to encrypted data on iCloud. Apple refused
26:19
Speaker 2: to comply and instead removed the ability to enable advanced
26:24
Speaker 2: data protection functionality on Apple devices here in the UK.
26:28
Speaker 2: Apple then took the case to the Investigatory Powers Tribunal,
26:31
Speaker 2: which is the court responsible for overseeing the use of
26:34
Speaker 2: the legislation, but those hearings were to be held in secret.
26:38
Speaker 2: So a group of privacy campaigners, including Open Rights Group,
26:40
Speaker 2: Big Brother Watch, and Index on Censorship took that to
26:44
Speaker 2: the tribunal and a judge ruled that the hearings should
26:47
Speaker 2: be heard in public. The tribunal said that it did
26:50
Speaker 2: not accept that the revelation of the details of the
26:54
Speaker 2: case would be damaging to public interest or prejudicial to
26:58
Speaker 2: national security. And so that was a great step in
27:00
Speaker 2: the right direction. And the Investigatory Powers Act and its
27:05
Speaker 2: recent amendments, we've got to absolutely reinforce the point that
27:09
Speaker 2: these are an anathema to data protection. And anything that
27:14
Speaker 2: helps expose it for what it is is good news.
27:18
Speaker 2: The key point here is that while you and I
27:20
Speaker 2: want our data to be private, and Apple seems to
27:22
Speaker 2: want that as well, the government in this country doesn't
27:25
Speaker 2: want that. And worse than that, they want the fact
27:28
Speaker 2: that they don't want that to be private also to
27:30
Speaker 2: be private. So remember that under the legislation, it's against
27:34
Speaker 2: the law for tech companies to let any individual know
27:37
Speaker 2: that spokes have demanded access to their personal data. And
27:41
Speaker 2: that was the main argument in the hearing last week.
27:45
Speaker 2: And so we will keep reporting on how this goes,
27:48
Speaker 2: but this is clearly the first public hearing that's taken place.
27:51
Speaker 2: And so there has been very little other news to
27:54
Speaker 2: report on that particular issue. Hopefully more to come in
27:56
Speaker 2: the not too distant future. But in other related news then,
28:01
Speaker 2: Ofcom has announced that they have launched an investigation into
28:04
Speaker 2: Pornhub's use of age verification. In May, 2026, Pornhub deployed
28:10
Speaker 2: a new age assurance process for some users. These are
28:14
Speaker 2: the words of Ofcom. This process, Ofcom said, relies on
28:18
Speaker 2: signals from a third party, in this case Apple, that
28:21
Speaker 2: suggest UK users trying to access Pornhub may have completed
28:24
Speaker 2: Apple's age checks. The Online Safety Act, they say, is
28:28
Speaker 2: clear that it is the service provider's responsibility to ensure
28:32
Speaker 2: that any age assurance process is highly effective no matter
28:36
Speaker 2: at what stage an age check occurs. So Ofcom has
28:39
Speaker 2: decided then that because Pornhub doesn't seem to be doing
28:42
Speaker 2: what they're demanding, they've decided to open a formal investigation
28:46
Speaker 2: to establish whether ALO, which is the company that owns Pornhub,
28:50
Speaker 2: has failed to comply with its legal obligations under the
28:53
Speaker 2: Online Safety Act, in particular to use highly effective age
28:57
Speaker 2: assurance to prevent children from seeing pornography, and complete a
29:00
Speaker 2: suitable and sufficient children's access assessment. And they went on
29:05
Speaker 2: to say that as part of their investigation, they're going
29:07
Speaker 2: to consider how ALO implemented its age assurance process and
29:10
Speaker 2: whether it conducted the necessary due diligence before deployment. And
29:14
Speaker 2: they said that their investigation will not make a determination
29:17
Speaker 2: on how Apple operates its age checks. Now, this is
29:20
Speaker 2: hilarious because over the past year, I've been reporting on
29:23
Speaker 2: Ofcom's claims of fining porn companies for failing to comply
29:27
Speaker 2: with the Online Safety Act on age verification. And I've
29:30
Speaker 2: been making the point that they have zero chance of
29:32
Speaker 2: collecting the money. because that would mean they have to
29:34
Speaker 2: go to court in other jurisdictions and they've no budget
29:37
Speaker 2: for that. And here we are months later and the
29:39
Speaker 2: register is reporting just a couple of days ago that
29:42
Speaker 2: Ofcom has had to acknowledge exactly that. So the register
29:45
Speaker 2: reports that they say the regulator's director of enforcement, Suzanne Kater,
29:50
Speaker 2: told the House of Lords Communications and Digital Committee that
29:53
Speaker 2: although another payment arrived this week, realistically, the majority have
29:57
Speaker 2: not been paid. So Ofcom has imposed fines totaling more
30:00
Speaker 2: than £ 7 million on 11 service providers under its OSA
30:04
Speaker 2: powers so far. But when asked, it refused to specify
30:08
Speaker 2: exactly how much or how many have not paid nor
30:10
Speaker 2: detailed the payment that came in this week. So I'm
30:14
Speaker 2: going to take a wild stab in the dark here
30:15
Speaker 2: and say that actually they've had no other money. And
30:18
Speaker 2: I'd really be interested to know exactly how much that
30:21
Speaker 2: was that they claim to have received. But of course,
30:24
Speaker 2: another organization that they've tried to find, aside from the
30:27
Speaker 2: pornography companies, is 4chan, the discussion board. Well, 4chan decided
30:32
Speaker 2: to fight back, and they went to US court to
30:35
Speaker 2: try to sue Ofcom. And this demonstrates clearly why Ofcom
30:38
Speaker 2: hasn't been able to collect the money, because US court
30:41
Speaker 2: denied 4chan' s effort to sue in the US on this
30:44
Speaker 2: specific point. And that point is that even if Ofcom
30:48
Speaker 2: gets a court judgment in the UK to try to
30:49
Speaker 2: force 4chan to pay Ofcom will have to go to
30:52
Speaker 2: the United States, to a United States court for enforcement.
30:56
Speaker 2: And only then can 4chan take their own legal action
30:58
Speaker 2: in turn. So of course, keep in mind that the
31:01
Speaker 2: original intent of the Online Safety Act was to create
31:04
Speaker 2: a global regulatory regime. And this is what Burnham was
31:07
Speaker 2: talking about in his presentation when he's trying to present
31:09
Speaker 2: Britain as being the great arbiter of everything between the
31:13
Speaker 2: US and China and every other country in the world.
31:16
Speaker 2: So the intent is that Britain will become the global regulator.
31:23
Speaker 2: And in turn, they're going to force legislators to demand
31:26
Speaker 2: massive expansion of this regime internationally. So we're going to
31:30
Speaker 2: have to watch the space on that. Now, in the meantime,
31:34
Speaker 2: on the 30th of this month, in a few days' time,
31:38
Speaker 2: the Information Commissioner's Office becomes the Information Commission. Now, that
31:42
Speaker 2: might seem like a small change, but I'll explain what
31:44
Speaker 2: that means in a second. So this is as a
31:47
Speaker 2: result of the Data Use and Access Act 2025, which
31:50
Speaker 2: abolishes the corporation sole of the information commissioner's office. And
31:55
Speaker 2: that is an arrangement that vested every power in one
32:00
Speaker 2: named individual and hands the functions to a board of
32:03
Speaker 2: seven non-executive members appointed back in July. Regulatory powers and
32:08
Speaker 2: responsibilities carry over unchanged, according to the press release. And
32:12
Speaker 2: I'm going to add the words in theory, because we'll
32:14
Speaker 2: explain how they change in a second. The office says
32:17
Speaker 2: it will still be known as the ICO day to day.
32:21
Speaker 2: So why is this important? Well, it's because the information
32:23
Speaker 2: commissioner was at least notionally independent from government. There's lots
32:27
Speaker 2: to criticize the ICO over, but they've always been underfunded.
32:31
Speaker 2: And what I can say is, just as one anecdotal example,
32:35
Speaker 2: when I was going after the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development
32:37
Speaker 2: Office over Andy Price and the counter disinformation and media
32:40
Speaker 2: development team, they did everything that they.
32:42
Speaker 1: Could to help.
32:44
Speaker 2: And although it was ultimately unsuccessful, they did at least
32:47
Speaker 2: make an effort. But the new structure is built upon
32:49
Speaker 2: these seven non-executive members. And they're appointed by ministers, so
32:53
Speaker 2: they're beholden to the government. And they don't report to Parliament.
32:57
Speaker 2: There's no accountability to Parliament. And indeed, the chair's job
33:00
Speaker 2: specification asks candidates to weigh government priorities, such as economic
33:04
Speaker 2: growth and minimizing regulatory burdens. So if the freedom of
33:08
Speaker 2: information regime was bad before, I'm going to suggest that
33:12
Speaker 2: it probably wasn't. might as well no longer exist. And
33:15
Speaker 2: then finally, in this segment, I just wanted to mention
33:17
Speaker 2: that North Yorkshire Police is running live facial recognition in
33:21
Speaker 2: the city of York today. The police force confirmed this
33:26
Speaker 2: as its first ever deployment. It says images that do
33:29
Speaker 2: not match the watch list are deleted immediately. And the
33:32
Speaker 2: watch list itself is deleted at the end of each deployment.
33:35
Speaker 2: And they said that engagement officers will be on hand
33:38
Speaker 2: to answer questions on the day. So this looks like,
33:41
Speaker 2: at least as far as York is concerned, It's going
33:43
Speaker 2: to be a bit of a PR exercise and engagement
33:46
Speaker 2: with the general public. The deputy mayor for policing previously
33:50
Speaker 2: asked for and received assurances on data handling before rollout
33:53
Speaker 2: so we can all feel safe in our beds. And
33:56
Speaker 2: this is another force to be added to the list
34:00
Speaker 2: that is growing every single week at the moment. So anyway,
34:04
Speaker 2: that's that for now. Vanessa, let's come back to you
34:07
Speaker 2: and the United Nations General Assembly. And there was some
34:11
Speaker 2: Syrian representation there.
34:14
Speaker 5: Well, quasi-Syrian, yes, the current quizzling president of Syria appeared,
34:24
Speaker 5: as he did, of course, last year. And you can
34:28
Speaker 5: see there next to him, Tom Barrack, the Epstein-linked Trump
34:32
Speaker 5: envoy to Turkey. And Jelani, according to quite a few
34:40
Speaker 5: sort of reports from inside the UNGA, has rather embarrassed
34:45
Speaker 5: himself this trip. So let's start with the Israeli perspective.
34:51
Speaker 5: This was in the Jerusalem Post. Al-Shada, of course, which
34:55
Speaker 5: is his rebranded name, October the 7th cannot dictate Israel's
34:59
Speaker 5: Syria policy. and talks reached 90% agreement. Now that is
35:04
Speaker 5: slightly misleading, and they do correct it later on in
35:08
Speaker 5: the article, because actually, as Jolani said, they thought that
35:14
Speaker 5: they had, if we can have the, thank you, the
35:17
Speaker 5: post up on screen, he basically says we almost reached 90%. This,
35:23
Speaker 5: by the way, was in a talk with Brett McGurk,
35:26
Speaker 5: a former security advisor to a number of US presidents.
35:33
Speaker 5: He said that we reached 90% of an agreement with Israel,
35:36
Speaker 5: but then Israel withdrew from the agreement for different reasons
35:40
Speaker 5: that they put in place. Of course, then Israel started
35:44
Speaker 5: bombing much of the South. Now, this was from an
35:48
Speaker 5: opposition channel, Alawite Mountains, on Telegram. And if you go
35:52
Speaker 5: to the note, a few days ago, He spoke about
35:55
Speaker 5: his ambition to return the economy to 2010, pre-regime change.
36:00
Speaker 5: Now he's talking about his ambitions and dreams of returning
36:03
Speaker 5: to the 1974 deconfliction agreement between Israel and Syria after
36:09
Speaker 5: the October War or the Yom Kippur War, as Israel
36:12
Speaker 5: calls it. All his dreams are about returning to the
36:16
Speaker 5: time before the regime's collapse, talking, of course, about President
36:20
Speaker 5: Assad but he is unable to achieve it. Now, of course,
36:24
Speaker 5: other people also pointed out that while he's defending the
36:27
Speaker 5: Golan Heights, he's unable to actually go there. And this
36:32
Speaker 5: was one of the embarrassing moments for Jolani. Here he
36:36
Speaker 5: is talking to Brett McGurk, and he talks about how
36:39
Speaker 5: Trump basically handed the Syrian Golan territories over to Israel.
36:45
Speaker 5: And this is what he said.
36:50
Speaker 10: President Trump stood to the side of Syria, supported Syria,
36:54
Speaker 10: and issued a historic resolution or decision to lift sanctions
36:59
Speaker 10: off Syria, and I have a very unique relationship with him.
37:02
Speaker 10: But once when I visited him in the White House,
37:05
Speaker 10: I made a joke with him. And when he said
37:09
Speaker 10: about the Golan Heights that it has the sovereignty of Israel,
37:13
Speaker 10: I said, why don't you give New Jersey to the Israelis?
37:16
Speaker 10: You don't own Golan Heights to give it to them,
37:18
Speaker 10: but you own New Jersey. And I believe that New
37:22
Speaker 10: Jersey is full of Democrats and they are not voting
37:25
Speaker 10: for Trump. So it will be good to give it
37:28
Speaker 10: to the Israelis. So at least this is something that
37:31
Speaker 10: you own. But this President Trump doesn't own the Golan Heights.
37:38
Speaker 5: I think most Americans would be scratching their heads over
37:41
Speaker 5: Trump owning New Jersey. And I also think Sharaa should
37:45
Speaker 5: be rather careful. Jolani should be rather careful if the
37:48
Speaker 5: Democrats get elected next time around. But I also just
37:52
Speaker 5: wanted to point out in this image from the UNGA,
37:55
Speaker 5: you see there Ahmed al-Sharaa. or Jolani, then you see
37:59
Speaker 5: Asad al-Shaibani, the MI6 preferred candidate who's currently foreign minister,
38:04
Speaker 5: but then you'll see circled, and some people who followed
38:06
Speaker 5: the work at UK Column and my work in Syria
38:10
Speaker 5: on the MI6 incubated White Helmets will recognize former leader
38:14
Speaker 5: of the White Helmets, Raid Saleh, who is now some
38:18
Speaker 5: highfalutin title under the Sharia regime. But what is interesting
38:24
Speaker 5: is that he's at the UNGA. So this for me
38:28
Speaker 5: clearly points to someone that was effectively running an organization
38:32
Speaker 5: similar to the Syrian Arab Red Crescent is now elevated
38:36
Speaker 5: to a status where he's sitting next to the foreign
38:38
Speaker 5: minister and the president at the UNGA. And then I
38:45
Speaker 5: just wanted to move on to what Erdogan said about
38:49
Speaker 5: Syria in part of his speech.
38:53
Speaker 6: Dear friends, After 14 years of oppression, Syria initiated a
39:02
Speaker 6: new path with a December 8 revolution. Under the leadership
39:08
Speaker 6: of President Shara, we are witnessing Syria now moving toward
39:12
Speaker 6: its goal of becoming a safe and peaceful country in
39:17
Speaker 6: spite of all forms of internal and external provocations. We'll
39:23
Speaker 6: continue to stand by the brotherly Syrian people.
39:26
Speaker 2: On this journey.
39:30
Speaker 5: Now, you would assume that Jolani would be paying attention
39:34
Speaker 5: during Erdogan's speech as his greatest benefactor and the one
39:39
Speaker 5: that was certainly responsible for bringing him to power. But
39:41
Speaker 5: this is actually what he was doing throughout pretty much
39:44
Speaker 5: the whole speech. So he was effectively scrolling through social media.
39:52
Speaker 5: And another video shows Raed Salah pretty much doing the
39:56
Speaker 5: same thing. Perhaps he was checking on peace in Syria
40:00
Speaker 5: during the talk to make sure it was actually happening,
40:03
Speaker 5: which it isn't, of course. And then I just wanted
40:07
Speaker 5: to show this. This is a video. The sound obviously
40:09
Speaker 5: will be off, but you can read the subtitles. This
40:11
Speaker 5: is basically one of the protests ongoing as Jalani is
40:15
Speaker 5: performing at the UNGA talking about basically getting rid of
40:20
Speaker 5: the government, getting rid of Jolani. They didn't elect them.
40:23
Speaker 5: They don't intend to become a US puppet. They're fed up.
40:28
Speaker 5: They're fed up with the diesel prices going up and
40:32
Speaker 5: so on. So this is effectively the piece that President
40:37
Speaker 5: Erdogan is talking about in the UNGA. And then finally,
40:43
Speaker 5: I just want to come back to what Jolani said
40:45
Speaker 5: also to Brett McGurk about foreign militaries in Syria.
40:51
Speaker 10: And to have a legal status. So the Syrian state,
40:55
Speaker 10: I believe, very soon will not have the necessity to
40:58
Speaker 10: have any military or foreign military presence. And I believe
41:04
Speaker 10: we can go through the relations, diplomatic relations and respect
41:09
Speaker 10: with all the countries in the neighborhoods and the friends
41:11
Speaker 10: of Syria.
41:14
Speaker 5: Interesting. So he says he doesn't need any foreign militaries
41:17
Speaker 5: on the ground inside Syria. And yet two days ago,
41:20
Speaker 5: Israel bombed one of the remaining ammunition depots to the
41:25
Speaker 5: west of Aleppo that actually held much of the ammunition
41:30
Speaker 5: and weapons that Jalani might rely upon if he doesn't
41:34
Speaker 5: want foreign militaries on the ground in Syria. The explosion
41:40
Speaker 5: was heard as far away as 70 kilometers and people
41:44
Speaker 5: were actually injured by the ammunition debris that was falling
41:49
Speaker 5: in the nearby towns and villages. And it's worth noting
41:53
Speaker 5: it's the fifth incident of its type where Israel has
41:56
Speaker 5: effectively destroyed Jolani's ability to have any kind of structural
42:02
Speaker 5: military inside Syria.
42:06
Speaker 2: Thank you for that, Vanessa. Charles, let's come back to you.
42:09
Speaker 2: The Good Friday Agreement was supposed to have been signed
42:12
Speaker 2: in 1998, but here we are and the fallout from
42:15
Speaker 2: that continues.
42:20
Speaker 1: Yes, it absolutely does.
42:21
Speaker 7: And much of what we do here, some of which
42:25
Speaker 7: UK Column has reported on over the last few years,
42:28
Speaker 7: is obscured by a lot of very confusing and apparently
42:32
Speaker 7: contradictory legislation. Now, the reason for introducing this particular report
42:39
Speaker 7: now is that I have recently spoken to Lincoln Jopp,
42:43
Speaker 7: a Conservative MP, who put forward a private member's bill
42:48
Speaker 7: in the ballot. Now, he's also a former commanding officer
42:51
Speaker 7: in the Scots Guard, so he's got personal experience from
42:54
Speaker 7: time as a soldier in Northern Ireland, and therefore has
42:58
Speaker 7: a particular perspective on it. But the idea is that
43:03
Speaker 7: this is to act as a countermeasure to the bill
43:07
Speaker 7: that the government is trying to push through. But rather
43:09
Speaker 7: than explaining too much in the first instance, what I'm
43:12
Speaker 7: going to do is just play a short clip from
43:15
Speaker 7: Lincoln speaking, explaining what it is that his bill was
43:19
Speaker 7: designed to do.
43:20
Speaker 1: It's very simple.
43:23
Speaker 9: It would essentially mean that there could be no further inquests, inquiries,
43:28
Speaker 9: investigations or prosecutions of our Northern Ireland veterans unless there
43:33
Speaker 9: was new compelling evidence in the view of a Supreme
43:37
Speaker 9: Court judge. And what that did or would have done
43:41
Speaker 9: had it passed would be to draw a very fair
43:45
Speaker 9: line under the investigations which have already taken place in
43:50
Speaker 9: all these cases and raise the bar to a point
43:55
Speaker 9: whereby we could stop the vexatious and mendacious prosecutions. But
44:01
Speaker 9: if anything, it's not a free pass by any means.
44:03
Speaker 9: If something else came up, then there could, of course,
44:06
Speaker 9: be prosecutions because no one is above the law.
44:12
Speaker 7: On the face of it, that comes across as being
44:15
Speaker 7: a reasonable position to take. But what I would like
44:17
Speaker 7: to do is get some comment from Mike on it,
44:21
Speaker 7: but in specific, or rather specifically within the context of
44:26
Speaker 7: the legislation that is already in place and is supposed
44:30
Speaker 7: to have protected against exactly those things, but also bearing
44:35
Speaker 7: in mind that we're not talking about the suggestion that
44:40
Speaker 7: there should be protection for British troops in a sort
44:43
Speaker 7: of blanket sense, regardless of what may have happened. But
44:45
Speaker 7: it's just this idea that action may be carried out
44:48
Speaker 7: without the presentation of any new evidence. Mike, I just
44:52
Speaker 7: wonder what your view is on what he's said so far.
44:57
Speaker 2: Well, not so much of what he said, but as
45:00
Speaker 2: a general point, my position on the prosecution of of
45:05
Speaker 2: anybody that served in Northern Ireland is that this needs
45:10
Speaker 2: to stop. It should never have been happening in the
45:12
Speaker 2: first place. There was immunity from prosecution given to one
45:16
Speaker 2: side of this conflict, which of course was a conflict
45:20
Speaker 2: which was generated by the British government in the first place.
45:23
Speaker 2: Because as a result of the Good Friday Agreement, anybody
45:26
Speaker 2: that was fighting with the Irish Republican Army or any
45:30
Speaker 2: of the other Irish terrorist groups has been given immunity
45:33
Speaker 2: from prosecution. In the meantime, there's been this pursuit over
45:37
Speaker 2: historical abuses by British military veterans. Now, the fact of
45:43
Speaker 2: the matter is there were excesses of behavior on both
45:49
Speaker 2: sides of that conflict. People were pushed together that shouldn't
45:52
Speaker 2: have been pushed together, and it was done in a
45:55
Speaker 2: particular way. And so that's not in any way to
45:59
Speaker 2: excuse any wrongdoing by anyone.
46:01
Speaker 1: But if you're going to.
46:02
Speaker 2: Take away the right for redress on one hand, but
46:07
Speaker 2: insist on it on the other, that is an unfair
46:09
Speaker 2: process and it should not be the case.
46:14
Speaker 7: Yeah, I mean, I think that's an extremely good point.
46:16
Speaker 7: And you're quite right to go back over that timeline because,
46:19
Speaker 7: of course, it's perfectly ridiculous that there was a new
46:21
Speaker 7: act in 2023. So the existing act in place at
46:24
Speaker 7: the moment is the Northern Ireland Troubles Legacy and Reconciliation Act.
46:28
Speaker 7: But as you see on screen now, the government put
46:31
Speaker 7: out a statement last year saying that the Northern Ireland
46:33
Speaker 7: Troubles Bill, a new bill, is to repeal and replace
46:36
Speaker 7: the Legacy Act. Now, some of the justification for that
46:39
Speaker 7: is because they say that there was an infringement of
46:43
Speaker 7: human rights legislation, particularly European human rights legislation, which of
46:46
Speaker 7: course the British government is tied into, or in effect
46:49
Speaker 7: the British Isles is tied into, large parts of, by
46:52
Speaker 7: the Human Rights Act 1998. And this is sort of
46:54
Speaker 7: at the heart of The issue and what the government
47:03
Speaker 7: is claiming to be able to do now is to
47:06
Speaker 7: put in safeguards, but safeguards that are specifically based on
47:11
Speaker 7: amendments after the fact. Now, Lincoln-Jopp's point is that this
47:15
Speaker 7: all needs to be tied down before. And also, of course,
47:18
Speaker 7: it raises the question that if there were human rights concerns,
47:21
Speaker 7: why did they not come out before the previous act
47:24
Speaker 7: was passed in 2023? So this is what he further
47:27
Speaker 7: had to say on the problem as it is.
47:31
Speaker 9: We have the government's new bill going through Parliament, and
47:34
Speaker 9: that has not got sufficient protection in it. And we
47:39
Speaker 9: have been told by the government, well, just wait and
47:42
Speaker 9: see what amendments we bring to our own bill, because
47:44
Speaker 9: we've consulted widely with the veterans community. And in advance
47:48
Speaker 9: of that, I thought that I would bring in a
47:51
Speaker 9: bill that covers a great deal of what veterans do want.
47:56
Speaker 9: And don't get me wrong, if they want to make
47:58
Speaker 9: this one of their amendments, I'd be the happiest veteran
48:01
Speaker 9: in the United Kingdom. And if they want to call it,
48:04
Speaker 9: you know, their idea, even better, because then they'll get
48:08
Speaker 9: buy in from their own side. But I think it's
48:11
Speaker 9: completely fair. It's very straightforward. And it raises the bar
48:15
Speaker 9: to a sufficient level such that we can draw something
48:19
Speaker 9: of a fairer line under these prosecutions, because Let's face it,
48:24
Speaker 9: these prosecutions are being used as a continuation of the
48:28
Speaker 9: troubles by legal means.
48:33
Speaker 7: I think there'll be a lot of people who'd agree
48:35
Speaker 7: with his last point. I think the other thing that's
48:36
Speaker 7: worth noting, of course, is that this is specifically to
48:39
Speaker 7: do with the individuals who were put there at the
48:42
Speaker 7: behest of the establishment. And of course, this is actually
48:45
Speaker 7: only to deal with those veterans rather than the people
48:47
Speaker 7: that were making any of the decisions about this. Now,
48:50
Speaker 7: I went on to ask him about how this apparent
48:53
Speaker 7: lack of protection for veterans will affect the idea that
48:57
Speaker 7: people might go ahead and join the armed forces now
48:59
Speaker 7: and of course this is something we've covered in great
49:01
Speaker 7: detail the the endless push for war and the suggestion
49:04
Speaker 7: that people should be coming forward and or even conscription
49:07
Speaker 7: but also the effect on morale in those serving in
49:11
Speaker 7: the armed forces at the minute and this is how
49:12
Speaker 7: he answered that.
49:15
Speaker 9: Your audience again will probably know that you know we
49:19
Speaker 9: we in the in divide the components of fighting power
49:23
Speaker 9: into three components, the physical components, the guns and the bullets,
49:28
Speaker 9: the conceptual components, the tactics, the strategy, the way in
49:31
Speaker 9: which we fight. But the third element is the moral component.
49:35
Speaker 9: which is why we fight, why we're prepared to pay
49:38
Speaker 9: the ultimate sacrifice in pursuit of the mission, and why, essentially,
49:43
Speaker 9: servicemen and women have unlimited liability, as it's euphemistically called,
49:48
Speaker 9: and why we had to invent the thing called the
49:50
Speaker 9: military covenant, because you can't write a contract for military service.
49:57
Speaker 9: It's impossible, because how can you write a contract which
49:59
Speaker 9: shows you might have to die for your country? So
50:02
Speaker 9: that's where the moral component comes in, and the moral
50:04
Speaker 9: component As Napoleon observed, the moral is to the physical
50:08
Speaker 9: as three is to one. And we undermine the moral
50:11
Speaker 9: component of fighting power at our absolute peril. And in
50:15
Speaker 9: what we are doing or risk doing with this Northern
50:19
Speaker 9: Ireland legislation and this pursuit of lawfare, we are undermining
50:23
Speaker 9: the moral component of fighting power. You know, if we
50:27
Speaker 9: need it, we're in any doubt about that. Someone sent
50:29
Speaker 9: me a meme on my phone and it was a photograph.
50:32
Speaker 9: It wasn't fake or anything. It was a picture of
50:34
Speaker 9: Keir Starmer talking to some real troops who were.
50:36
Speaker 1: Just about to deploy somewhere.
50:38
Speaker 9: And the caption said, we want you to go to
50:40
Speaker 9: Ukraine where we'll tell you to do things that we're
50:43
Speaker 9: going to prosecute you for in 30 years time. And
50:47
Speaker 9: it's that sort of pernicious messaging which weakens our country
50:51
Speaker 9: and plays into the hands of our enemies. And most importantly,
50:55
Speaker 9: undermines the gatekeepers, the parents who are thinking, do I
50:58
Speaker 9: want my son or daughter to go into the armed forces?
51:02
Speaker 9: And that's a huge worry.
51:05
Speaker 1: And we need to get a grip there.
51:10
Speaker 7: Now, whether or not you agree with what it is
51:13
Speaker 7: that he has to say, I should point out that
51:15
Speaker 7: credit should go to Lincoln Jopp for agreeing to speak
51:17
Speaker 7: to UK column. And I know that sounds like a
51:19
Speaker 7: ridiculous thing to say, but he joins only a very,
51:21
Speaker 7: very short list of serving members of parliament who are
51:23
Speaker 7: willing to do so. So there is definitely a lot
51:26
Speaker 7: to think on. And also he has agreed to speak
51:28
Speaker 7: again in future. Now, Mike, I don't know if we've
51:29
Speaker 7: got time to show what somebody else might be thinking
51:31
Speaker 7: about the idea of people sacrificing their lives or whether
51:34
Speaker 7: you've just got a sort of brief comment on what
51:36
Speaker 7: we've been looking at so far.
51:39
Speaker 2: Yeah, Charles, I just want to, first of all, suggest
51:43
Speaker 2: if you want to find out more about lawfare, go
51:45
Speaker 2: and look at the first ever episode of the David
51:49
Speaker 2: Ellis Report. You'll find it on the UK column website.
51:51
Speaker 2: And I just want to mention Dennis Hutchings, because this
51:55
Speaker 2: gives a perfect example of how really the pursuit of
52:00
Speaker 2: some of these guys is just off the scale. I mean,
52:03
Speaker 2: Dennis Hutchings died as a result, you know, I'm not
52:06
Speaker 2: going to say as a result of the process. The
52:08
Speaker 2: process certainly contributed, but he was taken to a court
52:11
Speaker 2: in Belfast for the final hearing with stage four cancer,
52:14
Speaker 2: and he died while he was there. So, you know,
52:17
Speaker 2: this is the kind of degree that they are trying
52:19
Speaker 2: to pursue these guys, and it is completely inappropriate. If
52:23
Speaker 2: you're going to have a judicial process over what happened
52:28
Speaker 2: 30 years ago, it needs to be applied equally across
52:30
Speaker 2: the board. I just absolutely want to reinforce that. But look,
52:33
Speaker 2: we've got to We've got to move back to Vanessa now.
52:36
Speaker 2: And Vanessa, last visit to the UN General Assembly for today.
52:40
Speaker 2: And what was Trump up to?
52:44
Speaker 5: Well, I mean, what is he ever up to? So
52:49
Speaker 5: let's have a quick delve into his UNGA speech, which
52:54
Speaker 5: I think lived up to expectation with regards to Iran.
52:58
Speaker 5: So let's roll this.
53:01
Speaker 11: For 51 years, the fanatical Iranian president regime has ruled
53:05
Speaker 11: by bloodshed and mass murder, spreading death and carnage and
53:10
Speaker 11: chaos across the entire Middle East and beyond. They were
53:15
Speaker 11: the bully of the Middle East, but they are the
53:17
Speaker 11: bully no more. From the first day I entered the
53:20
Speaker 11: political arena, I've been unwavering. I will never allow Iran
53:25
Speaker 11: to have a nuclear weapon. Upon taking office last year,
53:30
Speaker 11: I immediately opened negotiations with Iran and offered them full
53:33
Speaker 11: economic cooperation in exchange for ending their nuclear program and
53:39
Speaker 11: support for terror, but they refused.
53:45
Speaker 5: Well, needless to say, there's a lot of production going
53:48
Speaker 5: on there, not least of all, of course, following up
53:52
Speaker 5: on the Minab massacre of schoolchildren during the 40-day war
53:58
Speaker 5: against Iran, the most recent one, inside the U.S. kill
54:01
Speaker 5: chain that destroyed an Iranian school. So let's see how
54:08
Speaker 5: they excused this away.
54:10
Speaker 9: Two U.S.
54:11
Speaker 5: Tomahawk missiles obliterated in an elementary school in Manab on
54:15
Speaker 5: February the 28th, the same day, of course. They assassinated
54:18
Speaker 5: the scream leader and members of his family, including his granddaughter,
54:23
Speaker 5: killing more than 150 people, including at least 123 children.
54:29
Speaker 5: In terms of child casualties, it's the deadliest American military
54:33
Speaker 5: targeting error. That shows you where this is heading of
54:39
Speaker 5: the 21st century. An internal Pentagon probe describes a cascade
54:43
Speaker 5: of preventable failures, outdated intelligence, compressed war planning, heavy reliance
54:49
Speaker 5: on AI tools, and gutted civilian protection units that never
54:53
Speaker 5: reviewed the site. So months later, the US has not
54:57
Speaker 5: publicly accepted responsibility. So they're trying to palm it off
55:00
Speaker 5: basically onto outdated information and AI. So AI serves its
55:06
Speaker 5: purpose yet again from a different perspective. And I just
55:10
Speaker 5: wanted to show this. This is just one of the
55:13
Speaker 5: children that was obviously injured and has recovered from the
55:18
Speaker 5: targeting of the school. We can see just a couple
55:21
Speaker 5: of other images of his awful, injuries. So when Trump
55:26
Speaker 5: is talking about bloodthirsty and bullying and intimidation, of course,
55:31
Speaker 5: he should be talking about the United States and Israel
55:34
Speaker 5: and the entire Anglo-American imperialist complex. But then let's hear
55:40
Speaker 5: him talk about the potential for a deal with Iran.
55:48
Speaker 11: But I have a big decision to make.
55:51
Speaker 1: Will a deal be made with Iran?
55:54
Speaker 11: That lets them rebuild and create a far greater country
55:58
Speaker 11: than it ever was before, maybe one of the greatest
56:03
Speaker 11: in the Middle East or even the world? Or do
56:06
Speaker 11: I annihilate the Islamic Republic and do it quickly, never
56:11
Speaker 11: giving them a chance to kill and destroy people and
56:15
Speaker 11: countries again? Do I drive them into hell with no
56:19
Speaker 11: chance of survival and no hope of future greatness or generations?
56:25
Speaker 11: But I believe we'll make a deal right after the election,
56:30
Speaker 11: because it doesn't make sense for them not to. They're
56:33
Speaker 11: waiting to see how I do in the midterm election.
56:37
Speaker 11: What they don't realize is that I'm not running. I
56:40
Speaker 11: did that already and won in a landslide.
56:48
Speaker 5: There has been some criticism, even in Iranian media, of
56:51
Speaker 5: the fact that President Pesach Kian and Abbas al-Rashi, the
56:55
Speaker 5: foreign minister, have been taking part in indirect negotiations with Qatar, mediating.
57:02
Speaker 5: They've delivered their peace conditions to U.S. envoys in a
57:05
Speaker 5: three-hour UN indirect meeting. So Qatar is acting as the
57:09
Speaker 5: runner for the messages between the two groups. Um, and
57:14
Speaker 5: Witkoff went on to social media on to X this
57:18
Speaker 5: morning to say on the sidelines of the UNGA, we
57:21
Speaker 5: engaged in lengthy talks with the Iranian delegation through the
57:24
Speaker 5: mediators who shuttled between the two sides throughout the day.
57:27
Speaker 5: They successfully completed a round of discussions that we hope
57:31
Speaker 5: will prove constructive and promising. The mediators will continue their work.
57:35
Speaker 5: Of course, we should have absolutely no faith in any
57:37
Speaker 5: of these negotiations. And the capture of the face of
57:41
Speaker 5: the sole Iranian representative, I think, says it all as
57:46
Speaker 5: regards an Iranian reaction to what Trump was saying. It's
57:50
Speaker 5: also worth noting that in the GCC meeting that Trump attended,
57:54
Speaker 5: he apparently said there is a major, very major step
57:58
Speaker 5: we are about to take against Iran. Whoever is not
58:00
Speaker 5: with us in this war will not receive U.S. protection.
58:04
Speaker 5: This is a pivotal stance that you must all take.
58:08
Speaker 5: And I just want to end with Scott Besant. So
58:10
Speaker 5: while Trump is claiming to talk about agreements, let's listen
58:14
Speaker 5: to what Scott Besant, the Treasury Secretary, said.
58:19
Speaker 12: And that's when we were given many of the authorities
58:22
Speaker 12: that we have now. We got five new authorities about
58:26
Speaker 12: a month ago that we've implemented against the Iranian regime,
58:29
Speaker 12: including on aviation, maritime, crypto, gold. On September 23rd, all
58:36
Speaker 12: the Iranian airlines, all the Iranian airlines will be shut
58:39
Speaker 12: down around the world. And how do we do that?
58:43
Speaker 12: That if they land, you cannot provide them with fuel.
58:46
Speaker 12: You cannot provide them with landing services. You cannot sell
58:49
Speaker 12: them tickets or you will be knocked out of the
58:51
Speaker 12: dollar system. And what we're seeing here, Joe, is we've
58:55
Speaker 12: seen enablers throughout the world.
58:59
Speaker 1: We know who they are.
59:00
Speaker 12: They know who they are. And we are putting a
59:02
Speaker 12: stop to it.
59:06
Speaker 5: So not exactly an honest broker in any agreement whether.
59:13
Speaker 2: Vanessa uh thank you vanessa um right charles let's uh
59:17
Speaker 2: just end with a quick and finally here because uh
59:20
Speaker 2: well this speaks for itself actually.
59:25
Speaker 1: It does.
59:25
Speaker 7: It's an absurd story, but it does bring something back
59:27
Speaker 7: into focus, which we haven't really been concentrating on very much.
59:30
Speaker 7: And of course, that is the occupation and the use
59:32
Speaker 7: of British air bases to perpetuate exactly the campaigns that
59:35
Speaker 7: we have been reporting on. And it seems utterly absurd,
59:40
Speaker 7: given my own experiences at RAF Fairford, where I had
59:43
Speaker 7: the police called by the US military police on the
59:46
Speaker 7: inside of the fence because they considered that I was
59:48
Speaker 7: a threat. And yet here we see on screen now,
59:52
Speaker 7: reported by Wiltshire 999s, that a light aircraft landed happily
59:58
Speaker 7: on the runway at RAF Fairford nearly two weeks ago
1:00:01
Speaker 7: without incident. So the point to be drawn out is
1:00:05
Speaker 7: that whilst this is a place of absolutely, apparently, maximum security,
1:00:11
Speaker 7: vigilance and surveillance. Apparently, the Americans were unable to either
1:00:17
Speaker 7: reroute or warn off or delay or, thank goodness, shoot
1:00:21
Speaker 7: down this accidental landing, which was aiming for Kemble, which
1:00:26
Speaker 7: is very nearby. But in actual fact, there they were,
1:00:29
Speaker 7: given a few cups of tea and sent back on
1:00:30
Speaker 7: their way.
1:00:30
Speaker 1: What an absurd story.
1:00:34
Speaker 2: Absolutely, Charles. Well, we'll talk about the absurdity of that
1:00:38
Speaker 2: more in extra in a few minutes time. So if
1:00:40
Speaker 2: you are a UK column member, do stay on the
1:00:43
Speaker 2: live stream and join us for that. If you're not,
1:00:45
Speaker 2: maybe you'd like to join and you can join us
1:00:47
Speaker 2: for extra as well. Thanks to everyone that's watched today.
1:00:51
Speaker 2: Don't forget, there's no Jerem or Carl tonight. There will
1:00:53
Speaker 2: be something that goes out at 1pm tomorrow, but we'll
1:00:57
Speaker 2: see you for another news program at 1pm on Friday.
1:01:00
Speaker 1: We'll see you then.
1:01:01
Speaker 2: Thanks for joining us.
1:01:02
Speaker 11: Bye-bye.