JOHN HUMPHRYS: Well, Frank Dobson, it seems that you are the ...... sorry, I can't hear you. FRANK DOBSON: Eh, didn't I. HUMPHRYS: Ah, there we go. Now I can hear you. Say that again. I'm listening. DOBSON: I say, we got a warm welcome from the BBC for my candidature. HUMPHRYS: Oh, I, we, you got the usual sort of welcome which is absolutely dispassionate reporting. Now then, you appear to be the reluctant candidate here don't you, because right up until July you were saying you didn't want to be Mayor of London. You wanted to hold onto your cabinet job. DOBSON: Well, I have thought about it very hard. Even before the last General Election I was talking to the Prime Minister and my Cabinet colleagues saying that the Mayor of London's job would be a very very important job and the person who got it would be one of the most significant politicians in the country and it was a really important executive job and not just somebody going around with a chain and opening garden fetes. But I was Secretary of State for Health and I was really committed to that task but various people have been approaching me over a long period of time saying we think you ought to run. I discussed it very carefully with my family because I was fearful of the possible intrusion from newspapers and other people into the private lives of my children and my wife and I've discussed it very carefully with them. They eventually said to me, go ahead, we think you ought to do it. I've discussed it with a limited number of very close colleagues and at the Labour Party Conference I finally made up my mind that I would tell the Prime Minister I was going to do the job. HUMPHRYS: It does seem that you've made a mistake in delaying though, doesn't it, because you've allowed others, Glenda Jackson and of course Ken Livingstone, to get miles ahead of you in the polls at any rate. DOBSON: Well I know Ken Livingstone has been going around promoting himself for the last eighteen months, and during that eighteen months on behalf of the Labour government I have been the Secretary of State for Health, doing an important executive job, rescuing the Health Service from the Tory chaos that we inherited and getting it back on its feet - it's not in as good a state as I would like to see it but we have laid the basic foundations for a new and better Health Service and what's more, we've done in co-operation with the professionals and other people on whom it will depend. Ken spent that time going round promoting himself, so certainly he is at an advantage but I've been doing something important, and important for Londoners too. HUMPHRYS: Yes, the trouble is, a lot of people seem to believe, certainly in reports this morning, that there is another explanation for why you decided to run, and that is that you wanted to hold onto that job, the Health Secretary's job, but Tony Blair said to you, if you don't run for Mayor of London, you are out of that job and you are out of the Cabinet. DOBSON: Well, that's a lie. There are only two people that know absolutely that it's a lie, one's the Prime Minister and one's me. And I ...... HUMPHRYS: .......and one or two others. Perhaps the Prime Minister spoke to other people, who knows? DOBSON: Well, he, he, he didn't speak to other people saying that, I can tell you, because he never even asked me to do this job. He certainly didn't twist my arm to do the job and he made it clear to me that if I wanted to continue as Secretary of State for Health, I would do so, and if you say that that's not true, you are calling me a liar, and I've never told a lie. HUMPHRYS: Oh I'm absolutely certainly not calling you a liar...... DOBSON: ........you would be John if you HUMPHRYS: ........no, no. DOBSON: .........pursue that story any further..... HUMPHRYS: ........no, no. Well what I'm, well look you see, there is a difference between saying something is true and saying that there is a perception. And rightly or wrongly, wrongly you tell us, and I am perfectly prepared of course to accept your word for that, rightly or wrongly, there is a perception out there that you're sort of 'teachers' pet', you know, that Tony Blair wants you to do this job, he's the man who wants you to take over London and that's not doing you any good is it, that perception. DOBSON: Well, I am quite happy with the thought as a Labour candidate that the Labour Prime Minister of our country elected two-and-a-half years ago, would like me to be the Labour candidate, and my former colleagues in the Cabinet all want me to do it, and the vast majority of Labour MP's, right across the political spectrum, men and women, black and white, want me to do it, and I am glad that the fourteen people who've recently been selected by the Labour Party in London to run for the Greater London Authority, with whom the Mayor will have to co-operate, they all want me to have the job, and I think it is significant that the people who know me best and would be most dependent on what I do think I am the best candidate for the job, and if you think that's a disadvantage, well I'm afraid I don't. It's a serious task that we've got here and it can only be carried out in co-operation with other people, we can't have a Mayor just standing alone, standing across the river and shouting abuse at the rest of the Labour Party. What we have got to have is a Mayor who can work with other people, other people in London, businesses in London, Trade Unions in London, local groups in London, Local Authorities in London, I have the support of virtually all the Labour Council Leaders in London. So I think that that is a great advantage, but if you're saying I'm just going to be a patsy and a mouthpiece for the government I can tell you that I am not, and if you ask those people who know me best, people in the Cabinet, Tony Blair or Chancellor of the Exchequer, they will say to you, I've always spoken my mind, and I'll continue to do so, and I'll stick up for London, just as I've always done, all the time I have been in Parliament, which is now twenty years working for Londoners. HUMPHRYS: The trouble is though, there has been a lot of abuse being shouted, hasn't there, in the past few weeks, which reinforces, past few months indeed, which reinforces that impression that I was just talking about, abuse heaped upon Ken Livingstone and indeed apparently Glenda Jackson herself from people within the Labour Party, they've been rubbished, apparently to support your candidature. DOBSON: Well, I've certainly not been piling rubbish on anybody. HUMPHRYS: No, others have though. DOBSON: Well, I don't know about that, but I've not been doing it because I believe that this is a serious job, and quite frankly John, I think the bulk of Londoners are much more interested in what the Mayor will do and the Mayor and the Greater London Authority will be able to do to transform our city, and not the internal affairs of the Labour party. HUMPHRYS: Well that's true only up to a point isn't it? I mean let me just come in there for a second........ DOBSON: .....no it isn't. It isn't true...... HUMPHRYS: ......Well, no, no, no, because they are concerned........ DOBSON: .......no, John, let me answer your question. HUMPHRYS: Go on. DOBSON: If you went out and asked Londoners what are the most important matters to do with London now, they wouldn't talk about the internal affairs of the Labour Party, they would say that they are very bothered about the crime and disorder that really damages our city. They are bothered about the state of public transport, they are bothered about the fact that there are large numbers of people, particularly young men, out of work in this city, and they want it transformed, they want a better standard of life and they want a more equal distribution right across London of the benefits of London that's what they say. HUMPHRYS: Well they'd say that, certainly they would say all of that, but they would also say we want to vote for the person whom we want to vote for and not be denied that choice by the Labour Party. And what they see and this is why what you describe as internal matters are important, what they see is the election procedure, the selection process for the Labour candidate being rigged in favour of yourself. DOBSON: What the people of London are getting as a result of a Labour Government and a Labour Cabinet, of which I was a member, is the opportunity next May to vote for a Mayor and a Greater London authority. That's extending power and choice to people just as we've extended it in Scotland and in Wales and I'm in favour of more and more people having a bigger and bigger say and.. HUMPHRYS: Except that they're not, that's the point, the selection process, they believe has been rigged and they're not going to be able to vote for the candidate they choose. DOBSON: It will actually be a bigger electorate involved as a result of the introduction of the electoral college than other people previously thought was going to happen. I didn't decide it, the National Executive Committee of the party decided it. But let's get this clear, every individual member of the Labour Party in London will have a vote.. HUMPHRYS: ...weighted vote.. DOBSON: ..every member of Parliament, every Labour Member of Parliament in London will have a vote, every Labour MEP in London will have a vote, and every one of the candidates who the people in the party in London have elected to represent them in the GLA elections will also have a vote. And so have very large numbers of trade union members. And if you are talking about more people having a say then this is a way more people are having a say... HUMPHRYS: ... except that.. DOBSON: ..there will be dinner ladies, there will be bus drivers, there will be train drivers, there will be people working in shops, there will be people working in post offices and delivering the post.. HUMPHRYS: ..alright.. DOBSON: ...all having a say in who the Labour candidate should be. And, you know, it is after all the system by which the party chose Tony Blair who is the most popular and most effective Labour Prime Minister of the Twentieth Century and is leading us into the next century. HUMPHRYS: Let me tell you what the difference is, we were absolutely promised, the people of London were absolutely promised it would be one member one vote. Now you say it is.. DOBSON: ..by whom and when.. HUMPHRYS: ..by Nick Raynsforth and I can give you the exact date on which he said it, but you know it perfectly well because it was only a few months ago and he said quite...: 'the Labour Party will elect its candidate by one member one vote, that is clear. DOBSON: ...that's right. HUMPHRYS: ..and he was absolutely adamant there, he said it in the House of Commons, and what's happening now, instead of that, is that we have a system, sure the dinner lady will be able to vote and sure the MP will be able to vote, but the MP's vote will be worth a great deal more than the dinner lady's vote because of the way the election is going to be held and you know that as well as I do. DOBSON: You know as well as I do that every system is imperfect. No electoral system is perfect but this is the one that the National Executive Committee have decided on, not at my behest or request and at equal surprise to me as it was to anyone else. But it is the one that we have got now and you are saying and apparently those who are opposed to this actually don't want the dinner lady to have a vote.. HUMPHRYS: ...you know perfectly well that's not what I'm saying, the exact opposite.. DOBSON: ..yes you are.. HUMPHRYS: ..I'm saying the exact opposite, I'm saying that they should all have an equal vote. DOBSON: You're saying you don't like that system and when you say you don't like that system, you're saying the dinner lady shouldn't have a vote. Can I suggest that we actually go on to talk about the things that really bother London.. HUMPHRYS: ..one more question on this and then we will certainly do that. Let me put this to you then, because you are clearly in favour of the absolute maximum amount of democracy, so therefore the trade union members themselves, as you say the trade unions will have a vote, they could exercise it as a block vote or what they could do is ballot their individual members. Now presumably you will say most certainly should ballot their individual members to decide whom their union should support. I take it that is your position. DOBSON: I believe that they should ballot their members yes. HUMPHRYS: Their individual members, right okay, and that should apply to each of them, fine, alright. Let's look at some of your policies now. Transport - DOBSON: ...I'm glad we've got round to that.. HUMPHRYS: ..well you know, it was very important. Democracy, as you would be the first to admit, is usually important, that's what I wanted to talk about, we've done that and I appreciate it. Thank you very much. Let's now talk about policies and look at transport. We know what the government wants to do with London's transport crisis it has to be described as, as I suspect you would agree and particularly with the Underground, sell off parts of the Underground, part of this public-private partnership that we all talk about now. Do you want to do that as well, do you want to sell off parts of the Underground? DOBSON: No, we don't want to sell off parts of the Underground and you are misleading the public by saying that the government want to. But the background to all this is that there has been the London Underground, the suburban trains and the buses in London have been starved of investment for years and they've also been badly managed for years and what we have got to do is to look at a whole variety of ways of getting more investment in and better management. And what the government are proposing is that London Underground should continue to be operated, exclusively by the publicly owned and publicly controlled London Underground, but that the upgrading and maintenance of the lines should be contracted out and that the contractors would have to find the capital to do it, about seven to eight to nine billion pounds over a period of about ten years to get those lines up to scratch. In many cases those contractors would in any case be involved in doing the work but they wouldn't be taking any of the risks and they wouldn't be carrying any of the financial risks. What we've got to do, instead of just borrowing money from the private sector, which is how the financing is always done, if we want to make sure that the private sector actually puts something else in besides the money. And that's management effort and also take responsibility, just as they have, if I may go on, as they have with the nineteen new hospitals which were started while I was Secretary of State for Health. Nineteen new hospitals have started using private finance and that means that they are going to be built on time and to price, and if they are not built on time and to price it won't be the taxpayer who's got to find the money, it will be the private sector and with that incentive in place, as a token novelty in the Health Service, John, the Health Service management in several parts of the country are now facing the prospect of their new hospital being completed six months ahead of schedule and on price compared with the average twenty per cent over runs and two and three year delays. I think that applying that principle to getting the tubes uprated and improved is quite sensible. HUMPHRYS: Right, you approve of the....you support the government's policy which would in effect mean selling off about a third of the Underground to Railtrack, that's the effect of it. DOBSON: No, it doesn't amount to that John and you ought to know it doesn't. Let's take the Northern Line, on the Northern Line the trains have been provided, the new trains there have been provided under a leasing agreement and the company who made them has to maintain them for the next, I don't know, twenty or thirty years and keep them in good nick. Now nobody is telling you, you wouldn't describe that as selling off the Northern Line and the leasing arrangement there isn't very much different from giving private consortia the responsibility for upgrading and God knows they need it, upgrading the tube lines and then maintaining them and I might add that the Health and Safety Executive have been fully involved in all this process and that the Health and Safety Executive have quite rightly criticised the present management of London Underground for not involving the trade unions in this matter in the way that they should have done. HUMPHRYS: Right. So you back the Government's position, you're happy for Railtrack to be involved in that sense? DOBSON: I am prepared to look at anybody doing it, but there is no final commitment to Railtrack or anybody else being involved. No, there isn't any final commitment until next year, that the bids that they put in will have to be looked at carefully to see that they are a god bargain for everybody, and they will be vetted again by the Health and Safety Executive to check that the proposals are safe, and if and only if those conditions are met will any of these arrangements go ahead. But that isn't the only way, we can look at other ways of financing the tube, we can look at other ways of improving the buses, and we've got to - you know, God knows we've got to use London's strength to deal with London's weaknesses. We've got the City of London, probably the most important financial centre in the world and we don't make enough use of its money . Money from the finance houses in the City is pouring into cities in Europe to improve their infrastructure. We need arrangements to get it poured into London as well. HUMPHRYS: Let's have a look at crime in London. One of your concerns - everybody else of course is security - crime in London. One of the ways you want to make London a safer place is to reintroduce people like park keepers and caretakers and porters at hospital entrances, and all this sort of thing, because that would make people feel much more secure, it would create a different kind of impression. Do you want to do the same in that case for the Underground, and reinstate guards on the Underground, which would make an awful lot of people feel an awful lot safer? DOBSON: What I've said about that is we, over a long period of time in the name of efficiency all sorts of people who, by their presence deterred crime and vandalism and intimidation, like park keepers, like caretakers, like people on the tube, they've been removed in the name of efficiency, and what I want to make sure is that when people are looking at how things are managed and how things are staffed in future then the impact of what they've done on crime and disorder is assessed and given a proper priority, but one of the other things I want to do is to try to make things safer for people at work, because there are large numbers of people who are assaulted at work at the moment. The people in the Health Service and I have been trying very hard while I was Health Secretary to start some improvements there, to restrain the violence and intimidation that they sometimes suffer, ambulance staff and people in accident and emergency, but it isn't just them. One of the reasons why we find it difficult to retain or attract teachers to London is teachers can sometimes be subjected to violence and intimidation. It's the same with people who are working in shops, it's the same with people delivering the post. We've got to try to make sure with trade unions, with the individuals themselves and with employers and the police, everybody getting together to try to make it safe, so that people who are working, doing jobs for us are treated with dignity and respect, and not subjected to violence and intimidation. HUMPHRYS: Okay, but one word if you would - I'd be very grateful. Yes, I know you want to bring the guards back or at least you'll look at it. DOBSON: Well, I'd certainly look at it, I want to look at all those things. We've got to - we need to improve the performance of the police, although to be fair to the police most of them do a very good job, but we owe it to the police to make sure that the whole system and everything we do is geared to helping them help us make London a safer place. HUMPHRYS: Thank you very much. DOBSON: Because if we don't crack that we can't crack all the other problems. HUMPHRYS:` Frank Dobson, many thanks.