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This Week

04/02/2010

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has taken one step closer towards Tonight on This Week, is David Cameron marching his party towards victory or are cracks beginning to appear?

David Melor tells them to get a grip.

David Cameron has got to give the voters some positive reasons for voting Conservative otherwise Gordon Brown will lose, but David Cameron won't win.

Westminster's House of Shame.

It is pay back time for cheating MPs.

On planet Westminster this week, MPs finally got a rocket over the sky high expenses.

And we know that England captain John Terry has been scoring off the field.

Should we care?

We really need to be worried that the highest aspiration of so many girls is to Good evening all.

Welcome to This Week.

Come on, own up, who had the nerve to call this a rotten Parliament?

Ah, it was you Mrs Jones of the 10 the Railway Cuttings, Wigan.

48%, yes, nearly half of our MPs can be called honourable members.

Why?

Because they are the ones who didn't clover John McCain on their expenses.

-- overclaim on their expenses.

Why doing so churlish.

They were only obeying the orders of the finance office.

Meanwhile back in the real world of cross-dressing, Katie Price married her cross-dressing cage fighter in Las Vegas with television crews in attendance.

I am sure our great leader sent them a telegram of congratulations, that's the type of leader he is.

Speaking of celebrity, we hear that John Terry's mistress has only bedded four of his Chelsea team-mates.

Come on love, don't you realise there is eleven in the team!

Plus the substitutes.

Where is the Tiger Woods in you?

Let's cheer up.

Fancy a buff buffet on the Commons terrace?

We have just the woman to fix you up for a couple of grand.

It is our Diane.

A true servant of the people, if you are the sort of people who dine on the Commons terrace and our Michael will be there, after after speech at the ready and he is a couple of grand too.

Diane, your moment of the week?

was the finding of the coroner today.

It is in Cambridgeshire of the man who was killed by a German, locum GP.

Non English speaking?

Yes, non English speaking.

The point about this GP, although he is of Nigerian origin, had he come from Nigeria, he would have had to have language testing.

It is about the EU freedom movement.

If you are from the EU, come here and inject people and kill them.

Not intentionally.

intentionally.

I know you are an Euro-sceptic, but that's taking it too far.

second thing to the BMA, but this stems, this all stems from the BMA outnegotiating the Government…

this contract of out-of-hours?

BMA must have been laughing all the way to the pub.

In some parts of the country there is one doctor at night for 300,000 people.

It is terrible.

Michael, your moment?

During the week a professor, who is the head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was confronted with the the fact that some of the material supplied to the Copenhagen summit about the rate of melting of the glaciers in the Himalayas was completely wrong, completely exaggerated and he said, "Well, I am not responsible for everything that is printed by the IPCC" he knew about it before the Copenhagen summit and didn't draw it to anyone's attention.

He then said that all the fuss about these falsified figures was skullduggery.

Well, actually in my book if you produce false figures and don't correct them when you know they are false and people are making important decisions upon them, that comes close to being skullduggery.

Word coming out of India tonight is that the Indians want him out as chairman of the IPCC and if he doesn't go, they may set up their own Indian IPCC so the pressure is Now, as autumn turned to whicher last year, things were looking bright for David Cameron.

A lead in the polls suggested he was heading for a comfortable majority come the general election.

Since the start of 20 sorks the Tories -- 20 20 sorks the Tories seem to have lost their mojo.

There is three months until polling day, but the Tories don't look or sound as cocky as they did a few months ago.

We invited David Mellor Subtitles unavailable for 0 minutes back to his old stomping ground to So many memories.

Four election victories, one big defeat.

Mrs Thatcher's greatest triumph and now it is to be the headquarters of the European Commission, an irony, she must be appreciating.

Well I will put me plastic hat on.

I used to have to put me tin hat on when I was seeing her so nothing much The Tories have plans to recover from almost a big a wreck as this building and the public are disillusioned with Labour, there is no doubt about that, but the issue for David Cameron's Conservatives is are the public illusioned by them?

Do the Tories stand for anything that the public can get excited about, or are they like a sad old dog that has been kicked off so much when it comes out of its kennel, wants its tummy tickled but is bothered it's going to get I used to be chief secretary of the treasury in John Major's Government I am appalled by the state of the plbg finances.

-- public finances.

20% of the money we pay in taxes next yeerks it won't go on hospitals, schools and and the things we want, it will go on servicing the debt and no politician, no party should go before the electorate at the general election without spelling out to them the scale of this problem and exactly what they're going to do about it.

Otherwise, they will not carry the conviction Mrs Thatcher looked out of that window in triumph 30 years ago.

Will David Cameron be doing the same in a couple of months time?

It doesn't just depend on the public being fed-up with Gordon Brown.

They could scatter their votes like confetti across fringe parties.

David Cameron has got to give the voters some positive reasons for voting Conservative otherwise Gordon Brown will lose, but David Bob the Builder has run across from the old Tory HQ and turned into David Mellor.

Good to see you.

Welcome to the programme.

Are you saying if the Tories carry on the way they're doing, we're going to end up with a hung Parliament?

Who knows if the mathematics will cause a hung Parliament, they will not win a majority.

I think the public are fed-up with Labour.

They're particularly fed-up with Gordon Brown, but I think there is plenty of evidence now that they do not think that - they don't know what the Tories are all about.

Are the Tories really Tory, I guess is what a lot will be wondering?

Do you agree Michael, are we in hung Parliament territory now?

Yes, I believe the opinion polls a loted.

-- a lot.

Following my experience in 1997 where everyone said it won't be like that, it turned out as the polls predeughtd.

The -- predicted.

The trend is clear, sometimes last year, the lead was 15%, it is 9%, in December it was 11%, it moved a long way.

7% in the latest poll?

11% lead is on the cusp of just having a majorityover all or not.

A 9% lead or 7% lead is clearly hung Parliament territory.

It is like likely that David Cameron will be Prime Minister.

If Labour loses overall majority then Brown will be out, but Cameron in with a minority, not a good prospect.

I want to find out what Labour thinks in a minute.

I want more on the Tory situation.

What's gone wrong?

I don't think the Tories believe in themselves enough, you know, when you think Mrs Thatcher came to power because Ted Mete was driven out -- Ted mete was driven out -- Ted Heath was driven out by the public.

Five years later, she sweeps in with a mandate to sort out the unions which she did.

Now, David Cameron seems to take a different view.

He thinks the Tories are detested and therefore, he created the new model Tory Party which isn't Tory which has nobody in it who could remind the electorate of anything that happened before.

They are all inexperienced and he doesn't seem to want to it say say public, "look, this is a mess.

" The public finances are a mess.

You've got to face up to this this.

We've got to face up to it.

I, as your Prime Minister, aming going to lead in this direction.

To really sound like a man of principle and determination.

Telling it like it is.

Telling it like it is.

They don't want to to do that.

Because George Osbourne appears to be more along the lines of tell it like it is, before they get into Number Ten and number 11, they are writing Tories about the Chancellor, the potential chancellor and the potential Prime Minister falling out with each other.

You It normally happens after they have been in office a bit.

Diane, does the Labour backbenches feel there has been a change in the terms of political trade?

Yes, Gordon is more cheery.

Gordon is not an actor, when he is happy and confident.

When he is miserable, he is miserable.

When I hear David say the Conservative Party needs to move to the right.

It is not right or left.

It has got to do with telling the public what they are going to do.

It is PR stuff about smiling at everybody and telling them…

What I want to hear from you is not your advice to the Tories.

What I want to hear from you is what Labour's mood is now.

Do they Our polling shows that all of the people certain to vote, the Tories are 7% ahead, but adding in people who are uncertain to vote, mostly Labour people, really, the lead shrinks, the danger with what David is saying is if you make the Tory Party more recognisably Tory, you frighten some our voters so much that they come out to vote and narrow your lead.

So, to be clear, you think you are in with a chance?

We are more cheery.

Gordon Brown is more cheery.

How serious is the wobble?

Is it to be inelegant, put rightable?

Yes, but it is serious.

What has happened, to give David Cameron credit, by moving the party to the centre he gave the party a chance and moved it far ahead.

What has become more complicated since the economic crisis appeared in its gory detail, then they made the decision to try to be tougher on Labour on the economy.

Then they got worried that was frightening the electors, and then they wobbled.

That is the worst that they can do.

To have a position like Labour and stick to it, and then not.

The worst thing it do is wobble.

The Tory conference, George Osborne outlined the age of Australia tearity.

He said what you wanted him to say, that we are all in this together it is a mess, that we will have to be tough, this is not pleasant times and the voters started to go the other way?

think that the polls should be left to themselves.

What matters is that the Tories go into the election showing determination and quality of leadership.

Instead of appearing to everyone, smiling at everyone and getting elected that way.

I don't think that the situation that the country is in allows people to drift into power and a smile with a happy clappy Khapi like Dave.

Who he has got to turn into somebody as Margaret Thatcher.

The electors do not want to hear, we are all in this together.

It fiebs people, your -- it frightens people, your lead narrows.

Shouldn't the politicians tell us the truth about the dire position we are in?

Yes, in principle they should.

Neither side is now?

The history is that the last two elections have been fought on the Conservative Party saying that they would spend less -- more and borrow less withdraws consequences.

So David Cameron is looking at the situation and saying this is not the way to win.

If I were there, I would find it difficult to know which of the two options to take.

While I think that the political system has been obsessed with MPs' expenses, we are to talk about it later, there is a potential tsunami building up in Greece where sovereign debt is in real trouble, swinging into Portugal, hitting your beloved, Spain, and what's the other big European with a tonne of debt, that would be Britain.

We could be any second, you heard it hear first -- here first folks, we could anybody a second financial crisis.

We have been saying that for a while.

It is marvellous, yesterday, the European Union said that Greece is brogue such a huge proportion of its economy, we have to take steps, what is the proportion?

It's the same as Britain.

It may be that the cynical view is that that which Diane Abbott advocates, is not to frighten the public, but I don't see the point if you are to lead a party, without going before the public and telling them the truth, then out of that comes, I will have my last stab at this, what people want is somebody who is convinced that he knows and his people know what has to be done and who has the inner strength and conviction and command that shows that they are to do it, but smiling in the way that David Cameron does, is not going to work.

Let's get personal, he used to work for you?

Yes, I admired him a lot.

I still do.

Has he in it to be the tough guy, not in terms of policy, but in terms of approach, is he a Thatcher or a MacMillan?

I don't know the answer to that.

That's a question?

It is a question!

To be honest, I have no love for this Government.

I want the Tories to get back, but I can't say that they will, I can't answer that question.

Are you surprised that David Cameron is your leader.

No, don't answer that, I answer that question.

David Cameron watches this programme every Thursday night, he watch it is with his wife.

He is watching it now.

Give him one thing he should do to put the show back on the road.

to prove that Britain is a country that the politicians is as big as the problems that they have to tackle.

David Cameron take notice.

Now, for all of you have have taken your medication and after our words about Greece, a lot of you will be on the medication.

Try to stay up.

We have a treat, psychologist and author, Dr Linda Papadopoulos is joining us to analyse those involved in the John Terry scandal.

Given the numbers involved we may have to ask for tra time from the channel controller, if you are watching us, please let us overrun.

For those of you really damaged, you can sign up to our news letter and follow us on Twitter and get autoof the latest on who is on the show and what is on the show.

The madder you are, the more you will enjoy it.

President Obama has decided he can no longer afford the NASA affair, saying that it was too costly and lacking in invasion, better than being cheap and lacking in invasion like this show.

Lots of our MPs have been trying to save us money over here too, by generously agreeing to pay back the \xC2\xA3is million worth of dodgy ex -- the \xC2\xA31 million of expenses that they took from us in the first place.

It is deeply touching.

The chil the inquiry has cost us \xC2\xA31 million so we are no better off.

But Barbara Legg is.

-- but Thomas Legg is.

Here is a roundup of the political

I think it's going to be a long time before touch down gets me

I'm not the man I think I am at home.

Anything to ecape pre- election Westminster, with the silly squabbles of spending cuts and MPs' expenses, the sky is the limit with them!

The Tories have been betraying launch pad nerves with spending plans, lots of messages have been coming out.

It took George Osborne to put them right with eight benchmarks, I do love a benchmark, don't you.

Excuse me, this is my bus!

Rocket man.

We will set out a plan in our fij budget to eliminate a large part of the structural deficit in the first Parliament, making a start in 2010, the pace of fiscal consolidation will be coordinated with monetary policy and we will protect Britain's credit rating and international reputation.

Meanwhile, in a different galaxy, far, far away, Gordon Brown was insisting he's right to run up Britain's largest ever deficit.

It's logic of a cosmic sort.

I think it is right to have run a large deficit.

It's been essential for us to have the recovery that is necessary for the economy.

We have managed as a result of that in face of the biggest financial crisis that the world has seen for 78 years, to maintain far higher levels of employment than we would otherwise have been able to achieve.

Right, well, I have had enough of them row being nothing.

\xC2\xA31.

5 billion, that is all there is between the Labour and the Tory plans, nothing!

Meanwhile, there is an 80% chance of us loses our triple A rating.

That is according to Ed Balls' brother!

Goodbye, blighty, blast off!

I hope that this thing is not a Toyota!

Such a marvellous feeling of weightlessness, just like Gordon Brown's plans to embrace prolgs representation.

MPs' concern that this employ had no centre of gravity and David Cameron soon brought the Prime Minister back down to earth.

The last liberal leader suckered into this was Paddy Ashdown.

He wrote this, "Time after time, Tony Blair would say "yeah, Paddy, a -- I agree, but I can't get it past Gordon"!

And the Chile inquiry continues to unearth the dark matter.

Clare Short was there this week, she was talking about Tony Blair and his legacy, apparently that war was all about getting rid of Gordon.

It was a period when Gordon Brown was pushed out and marginalised at the time.

Having cups of coffee with me, saying that Tony Blair is obsessed with the legacy.

That is perennial black hole, the defence budget came up this week.

Former civil servant Sir Kevin Tebbit.

Tebbit said this, while troops were in Iraq, while that man was the Chancellor of the Exchequer, his budget, his budget was subject to arbitrary cuts and a guillotine.

He said "he was running a crisis budget rather than one with sufficient resources".

He cannot portray a picture of defence cuts, whether the defence expenditure has been rising.

The own Government to cut expenditure was the last Conservative Government that cut it by nearly 30%.

And Nick Clegg said how can you have a defence review and not mention the mother ship of defence spending, Trident?

He and he want to spend billions of taxpayers' money, replacing and renewing a nuclear system designed to flatten Moscow at the touch of a button.

How are we to face the threats that this country faces if Government thinking is so stuck in the past.

Then, Sir Thomas Legg kale over the horizon.

High pressure system will have to pay back a stella \xC2\xA31 million.

What with one Tory MP claiming for the flag pole rope, David Cameron was on a mission.

I hope that this is the beginning of the end of this dreadful chapter.

What is essential is that the MPs pay back all of the money identified.

Those who refuse to have it paid back it should be taken from salaries.

We need a totally transparent system.

It is all very well up here, but space is boring, not much gossip, I'm rather misting earth.

Hello, ground control?

Ground control?

Major Letts, to ground control?

Hello?

Hello?

He was last seen passing Jupiter on his way to Pluto.

Consequentin Letts, our man in space.

MPs's expenses is this the beginning of the end?

Just about.

I didn't have to pay anything back, but it is shameful, but we will not reach the conclusion of the stage until the election.

I am told that this will not be resolved by the election campaign.

We were doing it on the Daily Politics, we are confused.

We have had the Kelly Report, the Legg Report, the judge Poll levy, and now we have Ian Kennedy taking a different line from Legg.

It ain't over?

And the Crown Prosecution Service is announces who it may be prosecuting.

Indeed?

I think it is hopelyless confusing.

I think that some of the attention of the press will turn on what a ridiculous set of organisations that we have, but a general election is a pretty big event.

It is a threshold.

There will be in the next Parliament I would guess about 250 new MPs.

A big change.

It will be cathartic.

But how will it play in the election?

Will it haunt some MPs?

Will it be big enough to affect the outcome of some marginals?

Think so.

Some of the regions are all over individuals.

It will have an effect.

We are still getting people dropping out of the race.

In the last few weeks we have had so or is a MPs to drop out.

There is more to come.

When the expenses thing was at its height, everybody assured us, Mr Cameron, Mr Blair, Mr Brown, things will never be the same.

I am not sure that I believe him?

That is right.

The stage has gone on for so long, but once there is transparency, there are clear rules when the finances office is tougher, the things cannot be the same.

It is the biggest regulator, do we need these other committees, we have to post in great detail what you are claiming that regulates itself?

Also, if you are a new MP, you will be more careful.

Very careful, you will campaign saying you are not claiming for things.

What do you make of Gordon Brown's sudden conversion?

That was not a bad line.

It is a tactical manoeuvre.

We are told we will win votes in marginal s and greens, I am not sure that I believe it, but it is meant to be a If David Cameron can't nail Gordon Brown who after 13 years in office at the last minute, suddenly decides he wants to change the electoral system.

If he can't nail him with that.

He is not being nailed with things.

He is not being nailed with the economy or the cynical ploys.

On the backbenches, Diane, Labour backbenches, are they really in favour of this?

No.

I tried to interest you guys in the discussion we had the PL.

You did interest me.

I was disinterested.

You fell asleep!

I think they will ram it through because the Liberal Democrats will vote with it.

The Tories will oppose it tooth and claw, I assume?

Their defence will be not that this would be bad for the Conservative Party, but this is a ludicrous thing for any Government to do just before an election and start changing the the electoral system.

It is bad form to ram this through for an election.

Taking the principle of this alternative vote system whereby we don't put across anymore, we put our first choice, second, third and so on and the last person if you don't get 50% of the votes, the points are distributed until somebody gets 50% is that a better system than first-past-the-post or not?

I would argue not inasmuch as you know, I don't see why it is better to elect the person that is least objected to rather than the person that is most supported.

Diane.

Nothing will people PLP.

People will know how to use it to get the effect.

They did it in 97 and they will do it in this election.

So that's?

Two thumbs down.

Chilcot, Michael, is this the week it switched from being Mr Blair's problem to Mr Brown's brOb?

-- problem?

Certainly both Tebbit and Short's tems Short testimonies were bad.

You mean the secretary in the Ministry of Defence at the time?

Sir Kevin.

They have put Brown on-the-spot and Brown has still to appear.

This thing that is been bloody for the Labour Party and you know, dredges up stuff that they would rather not remember, but there is no sign of it in the opinion polls, is there?

No sign.

Do you think is it just a Westminster Village obsession or is the Chilcot inquiry and we all went live to, we did a Daily Politics Special, the news channels went live, is it it not resonate in the country?

It is not resonating in the way it did the first time around, but it is not good for us.

I might add it was Alastair Campbell that first dragged Mr Brown into the frame and other people followed on, but it is not good for us.

The thing is really about Blair and Blair went and gave a ma jis steeral performance.

It flew in the face of what the Government were claiming, we gave them all the equipment and the budget had been chopped and changed and moved?

Well, I suppose ministers would say, that's what the Ministry of Defence always says.

It never has the budget it wants.

Is the top brass and you will have a feeling of the relationship between politicians and top brass as a former Secretary of State for Defence, do you get a feeling that the top brass is out to scupper Mr Brown?

I think they dislike Gordon Brown and they liked Gordon Brown.

Gordon Brown has for a long time been indifferent to them.

He doesn't share their values.

He didn't accept invitations to be briefed in the Ministry of Defence.

And now he is Prime Minister like all Prime Ministers he tries to make capital out of the fact that the Armed Forces are magnificent people.

Did Clare Short tell us anything this week in front of Chilcot?

gave us a genuine feel about how the Cabinet worked out unBlair -- under Blair.

It was not a Cabinet.

Do you think Mr Brown might be regretting he ever agreed?

Yes.

It was meant to be in private.

He wasn't going to give evidence before the election.

He wasn't giving evidence at all actually.

No, terrible.

It It gave the opportunity for Blair to give a stellar performance.

Too late now.

All right, let's leave it and move on.

When I say WAGs, we are talking about wives and girlfriends of footballers.

England captain John Terry soon to star in ITV's new drama series, Other Footballers Lives has been in the headlines for scoring a lot away from home.

You didn't know that, neither did Wayne Bridge!

Are the footballers wives of today mostly down trodden women or do they know what to expect?

This week we put WAGs in the Little boys dream of becoming like their football ear football heroes and if little girls had inspirational hero wins, today many want to be WAGs, the John Terry scandal outraged many and thousands of little girls want to to grow up and mayy someone -- marry someone like him.

WAGs put on a brave and beautiful face, perhaps they send a dangerous message to their young admirers that cheating is is acceptable on and off the pitch and a woman's body is just her highest commodity to trade.

What will it take to stop girls from being lured into the darker side of the From fame on Big Brother to more fame on This Week, Dr Linda Papadopoulos.

Linda is there a serious problem about young girls regarding WAGs as role models?

think there is.

I'm undertaking a review on the sexualisation of young women.

So often these days young girls put their value in the way they appear and more important than that, not just on their body, but on their desirability.

They just desire to be desired and it is pred predicated.

I am being told if you want to have a good life and the glamour and the glitz and if you want to have easy money, it's all about aspiring to these positions.

Are we saying young girls today value themselves less than young women did years ago?

What we are saying, we are portraying monolithic examples of desirability for young women.

These examples centre around their appearance and their sexuality and how attractive they are and to a lesser extent to their abilities, or their bodies in terms of physical prowess.

Think about how differently we sill brate boys and girls in sports.

-- celebrate boys and girls in sports.

We don't celebrate girls for anything other than how they look.

Isn't it another aspect of a celebrity culture that seems to be taking over?

Celebrity is seen by many people now, youngsters, it is an easy way to get rich and famous.

You don't have to study to be a doctor for eight years or go to university, it is also very meritcratic.

Celebrities tend to be ordinary and it is an easy route to success, fame and dosh?

The fact that we have commercialised society so much.

Moral justifications as long as there is money involved, tas moral justification for anything.

A study asked over 1,000 young girls what their ideal job would be.

Over 60% said glamour model.

Glamour model?

Not even model, glamour model.

Teacher, and doctor was their choice and over a quarter said lap dearns.

-- dancer.

In my private practise as well, we are seeing girls with eating disorders at a younger and younger age and we are seeing parents allow children undergo plastic surgery at a younger age.

Has there been a cheang in as per - - change in aspirations?

Lots of young men who come from a disadvantaged background are suddenly given millions of pounds and the opportunity to buy everything including women, of course that is corrupting and of course these people aren't able to handle it and of course, they indulge in extreme behaviours, but what I don't think we can do is blame John Terry and take it out on this individual.

So far we have not laid a word of blame on Mr Terry.

I am not talking about this programme.

There is a man who has been put through the masher because he exhibits the behaviour that arise from being put in that situation.

I think it does follow.

Diane, do you agree?

Has there been a change this aspiration?

Well, it's scary to me how many young women want to be lap dancers and glamour models and believe the way to fame and fortune is to pump their breasts full of silicon.

Maybe the 70s and 80s were this period when women wanted to be independent and have professions.

If you go back historically, women traded their body and looks for money and looks.

What was Lily Langtry except a WAG.

I don't think that's the point.

That is the point, it is as if the feminist movement never happened.

I'm appalled.

My lifetime alone, being pretty has gone, one of the nice things to be, or being sexy, to be the central core of how we value women.

Another trend that's going on.

On American Network News, they led with the fact there are more women in the workforce than women.

There are more women in American universities than men.

There are more women who are now presidents of student unions, college college societies than men.

They are paid in the region 20% less than men.

So far?

So far.

It used to be 30%, 40%.

The fact of the matter, these statistics come out and you think girls are doing well.

They outperform boys at schools?

you look at the difference in girls in same sex schools and mixed schools, girls in mixed schools don't do as well as girls in same sex schools and the reason is once they feel they need to perform for boys that they genderised aspect leads them to do less work.

I agree with that and I am a card carrying feminist.

Show us your card.

I I I left it in the green room!

There is nothing new about women selling their bodies.

Of course.

I am depressed and you are getting this objecttiveication of came.

It has given, arisen not just to girls being wanting lap dancers, but boys engaging in gang rape.

You didn't have that that years back, boys treating girls like objects.

Boys tend to have different levels of how they relate to girls.

There is the links which is the girls you just have sex with and there is the wifies that you have more respect for and the girls that addresses boys.

Sex is called beating which I find interesting.

I I find that interesting.

We are not only hyper sexualising boys and when you have these things together there is a pee a potential for violence.

I am not sure politicians can do much about this.

There are things like - it is about education generally raising education standards.

All that will help.

Is it just a working class class problem?

People are willing to pay huge amounts of money to go to soccer and to be entertained at soccer and and television rights and that leads to these things.

That's it.

We have had important news coming in while we have been on air from Belfast.

The DUP, the Protestant party and Sinn Fein who were in coalition, it looks like it was falling apart, now looks they have come together and that they will go on to the next stage of devolution.

A quick response.

I am not surprised.

I am pleased.

The DUP didn't want an election, therefore they had to agree with Sinn Fein.

Sinn Fein don't apparently want to be the largest party so they had a reason to agree.

They looked over it and did the right thing.

The peace process continues.

Linda, thank you.

That's your lot.

We thought we would leave you with pictures taken in Westminster earlier today.

I think you will sleep better knowing that the boys in blue are on their toes keeping