|
====================================================================================
NB. THIS TRANSCRIPT WAS TYPED FROM A TRANSCRIPTION UNIT RECORDING AND
NOT COPIED FROM AN ORIGINAL SCRIPT; BECAUSE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF MIS-HEARING
AND THE DIFFICULTY, IN SOME CASES, OF IDENTIFYING INDIVIDUAL SPEAKERS,
THE BBC CANNOT VOUCH FOR ITS ACCURACY
====================================================================================
ON THE RECORD
RECORDED FROM TRANSMISSION: BBC ONE DATE:
09.04.00
====================================================================================
JOHN HUMPHRYS: Good afternoon. The
crisis in Zimbabwe continues. Can the government do anything about it?
Is the end in sight for local education authorities? We'll be reporting.
And what's the threat from English nationalism? We'll be asking how the
government's going to deal with growing calls for regional government?
And is the Northern Ireland peace process is it at the end of the road?
I'll be asking Sinn Fein. All that after the news read by Fiona Bruce.
NEWS
HUMPHRYS: For fifty years our schools
have been run by local education authorities. Has the government decided
that the time has come for Whitehall to take over?
And the fans proclaim
their nationality... will the government bow to calls for greater powers
for the ENGLISH regions?
JOHN HUMPHRYS: Tomorrow European foreign
ministers are meeting and they will talk about the growing crisis in Zimbabwe
that's threatening the stability of the whole part of Africa there. The
country was once a British colony and there are still tens of thousands
of British passport holders living there who are increasingly at risk from
supporters of President Mugabe. Earlier this week Robin Cook met Mugabe
and thought he'd managed to pour some oil on troubled waters but it didn't
last long. Mugabe was making more threats even before he'd returned home.
So what's to be done now? The Foreign Office Minister responsible for Africa
is Peter Hain and I'll be talking to him, but first the view from the Conservative
Party. I asked the Shadow Foreign Secretary Francis Maude why - since Zimbabwe
has been an independent country for twenty years - we should get involved
at all.
FRANCIS MAUDE: No, it certainly isn't our
fault but we are right to be concerned about it. There are fifty thousand
people in Zimbabwe who have British passports, or who are entitled to British
passports, so we have a direct interest in it anyway. But also it's a member
of the Commonwealth and you know we ought not to stand by when something
is going badly wrong as it is. You know I've had people coming in to see
me from Zimbabwe, the Editor of the Zimbabwe Standard for example, who
was locked up and tortured last year by the Mugabe thugs. The Opposition
has been systematically intimidated and there is now a process going on
there which looks pretty much like ethnic cleansing.
HUMPHRYS: But we have condemned
very strongly all those things that you talk about. We have offered a sort
of land deal to help the white farmers with strings attached, there's not
much more we can do is there?
MAUDE: Well actually there's precious
little that we have done by way of condemning it. Robin Cook last week
at the Cairo Summit where he met with Mugabe, actually really sat on his
hands, he spent so much time grubbing around promising to Mr Mugabe that
he wouldn't say unpleasant things about him that a very mixed message came
over. We should be very unequivocal with Zimbabwe. This sort of behaviour
is incompatible with the remaining part of the Commonwealth. You know the
Commonwealth if it stands for anything it stands for the rule of law, for
democracy and for open economies, which are the things that countries can
now choose to do if they want to be successful. Zimbabwe is potentially
a hugely successful country, very fertile, blessed with enormous natural
resources and actually it's being squandered and it's the people who are
suffering, black and white alike who are suffering under the yoke of a
very bad regime. We can stand up and speak up for what's right and we
can take some steps which actually put pressure on the regime to reform
its ways.
HUMPHRYS: Such as? - should we
throw them out of the Commonwealth immediately?
MAUDE: Well I think we should suspend
them from the Commonwealth yes, as I say if it stands for any values its
the values which are being trashed by Mr Mugabe. So yes that should happen.
We should suspend the military training that's still going in, we should
suspend the government to government aid because all of the indications
are that that aid simply gets stolen by the regime and is used to enrich
Mr Mugabe and his cronies so that should be stopped. Aid which goes directly
through NGOs and so on to people and to communities, that should continue
and aid for the National AIDS programme there, that could continue as well.
But direct government to government aid should now stop. So yes, there
are some real things that could be done.
HUMPHRYS: And you would include
the selling of Hawk parts, you'd stop that as well would you? - parts of
Hawk aircraft.
MAUDE: Yes, I mean that should
stop because, you know what's happening at the moment is that Mr Mugabe
is running a war in the Congo which is a purely sort of diversionary activity,
is giving no benefit at all to the people of Zimbabwe, it's costing them
a lot of money, a lot of money which would otherwise could be used to better
their condition, is being wasted on that. So that should be stopped as
well. And the other thing that we could do, is to think about freezing
the overseas assets of Mr Mugabe and his cronies. All the evidence is that
they have been stealing from the government and from the people of Zimbabwe,
treating it really as their own fiefdom and that won't do and there are
steps that can be taken to deal with that, so all of these are things that
could actually be done. As far as I can see Robin Cook is planning to do
none of them.
HUMPHRYS: European Union ministers,
foreign ministers are meeting tomorrow, they are going to be talking about
their aid, Europe's aid to Zimbabwe, should that be stopped as well?
MAUDE: I think one of the problems
with the European Union being so much involved with this is that it compounds
the impression which is actually very harmful in Zimbabwe, that this is
a sort of western, a patronising, you know ex-post colonial approach. It
shouldn't be dealt with in that way. The European Union is the wrong body
to be dealing with this. The right body is the Commonwealth because that's
in the family. The Commonwealth is a world wide organisation, it has a
lot of experience in dealing with this sort of situation, it does stand
up for the values which need to be reasserted in Zimbabwe. There's an opposition,
a vigorous opposition and a vigorously free press, despite Mugabe's intimidation
in Zimbabwe which is crying out for that kind of support. So we should
be looking for Commonwealth observers to be there during the parliamentary
elections later this year, assuming Mugabe doesn't seize the opportunity
to postpone them, to put them off and Commonwealth action in terms of threatening
suspension unless he mends his ways.
HUMPHRYS: So you want to get very
tough, but it sounded from what your leader Mr Hague was saying in Harrogate
last week that he wanted a better dialogue. He didn't seem to think that
Mr Cook should have been quite so nasty to Mr Mugabe.
MAUDE: No, it was not what he was
saying at all. You see what has gone here is that the Government have
refused to have the sort of frank relationship with Mr Mugabe that comes
from mutual trust and respect. They just haven't done that They've sort
of crawled around after Mr Mugabe with a patronising attitude, and actually
what one needs to hear is a respect...a relationship of trust and respect
where you can actually say what you think. There's nothing more humiliating
I think for Britain than the sight of Mr Cook on Monday grubbing around
Mr Mugabe sucking up to him, promising that he wouldn't say anything unpleasant
about him. What is needed is the relationship which actually is based
on the ability to talk frankly about what's going on.
HUMPHRYS: The trouble....
MAUDE: ...Mr Mugabe's letting his
country down, he's letting the Commonwealth down.
HUMPHRYS: Yes, but the trouble
with that is Mugabe's a pretty unpredictable sort of bloke, and he can
be a very tough guy as we've seen, and pretty brutal as well. Now if you
have the Foreign Secretary here rubbing him up the wrong way, saying things
that get him very upset indeed, who knows what effect that will have, an
even worse effect than is already being had on British people amongst others
who are in Zimbabwe. Now, we would then have to deal with the fallout
from that would we not?
MAUDE: Well, you see you just look
at what's happened this week. On Monday Mr Cook was crawling around Mr
Mugabe, you know, agreeing with everything he proposed, saying that he
would keep Peter Hain who seems particularly offensive to Mr Mugabe, keeping
him out of the room during the meeting, promising he wouldn't say anything
unpleasant about him, and then two days later what happens - as soon as
Mr Mugabe gets back to Zimbabwe he gets parliament to put through an act
which will nationalise and seize from farmers a lot of land without compensation
which will put a lot of black farm-workers out of their jobs, it'll ruin
their livelihoods. Now, you know, so did Mr Cook greasing up to Mugabe
have any benefit at all? No, it had exactly the reverse effect. It is
actually being firm, polite but firm that pays dividends here, and using
all of the influence that the Commonwealth can bring to bear which is considerable.
HUMPHRYS: But if it comes down
to it you'd live with the consequences, be happy to live with the consequences
of many thousands, perhaps as many as eighty thousand - there are eighty
thousand whites there alone, some of whom have British passports, many
of whom don't - you'd be happy to have all of those coming here to as it
where seek refuge from Mugabe?
MAUDE: Well, you know the right
thing to do is for the regime to stop trying to intimidate people out of
the country, to run things in such a way that it can be stable. You know
what countries need is the rule of law, open economies and democracy.
If you have that they will succeed, it's voluntary. What's happening
to Zimbabwe at the moment is a choice being made by Mr Mugabe, and it's
inflicting harm on it If he just does better things which is what the majority
of the public seem to want and if there are free elections, properly free
elections in May, then I think that's what will be shown in those elections,
if all of that happens then there would be no need - there's certainly
no desire for these people to flood out of Zimbabwe, they want to stay
there, that's where their home is, their life is. They want to make a
success of it.
HUMPHRYS: Francis Maude, thank
you very much.
MAUDE: Thank you.
JOHN HUMPHRYS: Well with me now is the
Foreign Office Minister, Peter Hain.
Mr Hain, what should
the government's position be here, should it be to isolate and to punish
Mugabe or should it be to try and appease him and buy him off?
PETER HAIN: Neither, we're not into either
appeasing him, nor are we into trying to punish him. What is important
is we stand by the Zimbabwean people, which he has not on in trying to
bring in a serious land reform programme for example that really does address
poverty and landless rural workers rather than handing it out to his cronies,
land which is not then farmed, or to agree an economic programme of reform
from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, but unfortunately
the policies that have been pursued have made that impossible. So we are
ready to help the Zimbabwean people, it's the government that is getting
in the way.
HUMPHRYS: But Robin Cook, the Foreign
Secretary, saw Mr Mugabe this week, apparently to try to cut some sort
of deal and no sooner had he said goodbye to him than Mugabe was sounding
off again and threatening to go to the trenches and all the rest of it.
HAIN: Well it has been
very difficult to do normal inter-governmental business with President
Mugabe, that's one of the sad things about it. We regret that, we want
to establish a relationship with the Zimbabwean government that behaves
rationally, that conducts its policies in order to support its people rather
than indulging in diplomatic fisticuffs with its oldest friend Britain.
HUMPHRYS: But seeing the way he
has behaved, not just in the past few weeks and months for many years now,
isn't it time to get really tough with him?
HAIN: Well John, some people
have accused me of getting too tough with him..
HUMPHRYS: Indeed they have..
HAIN: Some people have
said we shouldn't have been as strong, that I shouldn't have been as strong.
I don't take that view, I think that it's important that especially a Labour
Government, which has enjoyed close links with the struggle for freedom
in Zimbabwe against the old racist regime of Ian Smith and subsequently,
that when we see policies being pursued and activities being conducted
by the President which are wrong and not in the interests of his own people
we say so, and we say so bluntly.
HUMPHRYS: But it should be more
than that shouldn't it, more than just saying things bluntly and talking
tough, it should be tough actions, there are things you can do.
HAIN: Well people want
toughness and punishment and so on, what I want is success. I want the
Zimbabwean people to be in a country which is moving forward rather than
going down the drain and unfortunately and economically and in other respects
that is happening at the present time. What you do have I think in Zimbabwe
at the present moment is the beginnings of a debate, there is a strong
opposition for the first time in a long while and I think there is a debate
about the way the country is going and Britain wants....stands ready to
help when the policies are put in place, as I hope they will be sooner
rather than later, that enable not just Britain by the way, the Americans
have had to pull out their land reform support, other donor countries in
Europe are similarly frustrated. We are not alone in this but as Zimbabwe's
oldest friend, perhaps we have found ourselves in the firing line.
HUMPHRYS: But it's sending very
confused signals isn't it to the Opposition in Zimbabwe apart from anybody
else, if the Foreign Secretary goes to see...sits alongside Mr Mugabe as
he did in Cairo last week and to use the words of Francis Maude he seen
to be creeping and crawling around him and smarming up to him and humiliating
Britain in the process.
HAIN: No, it's right that
you should try and talk to a head of state as Robin Cook did in Cairo with
President Obasanjo of Nigeria as it were chairing the session. It's right
that every effort should be made to talk to people if it's possible to
talk to them, but I also think that it's important that the Zimbabwean
people understand as the government already I'm sure does, that Britain
is not a soft touch. We are not about to provide extra development aid
and assistance or dish out money simply because he's demanding it to a
flawed land reform programme or to assist with the IMF or the World Bank
providing financial support, we are not about to do that when the policies
that are being pursued are unfortunately bankrupt.
HUMPHRYS: But it does depend how you talk
as well doesn't it. I mean again to quote Francis Maude there, there was
the Foreign Secretary behaving in this way...
HAIN: ...that's not true...
HUMPHRYS: ...well I mean..he says
you wouldn't know because you weren't even allowed in the room, Mugabe
doesn't like you for reasons that are entirely obvious, you've been very
outspoken about him, you yourself have been very outspoken about him and
Mugabe wouldn't even have you in the room while he was meeting the Foreign
Secretary...
HAIN: That never arose
because it was...
HUMPHRYS: Were you there?
HAIN: No I wasn't because
it was a meeting between the Foreign Secretary and President Mugabe with
President Obasanjo there. I have met Robert Mugabe a number of times in
the past and we've had perfectly civil discussions but the point is not...
this is really juvenile stuff from the Opposition. The important thing
is to get in place policies that really do pull Zimbabwe away from this
desperate crisis into which it's been plunged by its own government, that
is the tragedy that is the sadness of the situation.
HUMPHRYS: The question is how are
we going to do it? We've got the European Union Foreign Minister's meeting
tomorrow haven't we to talk about various things including perhaps cutting
off aid to Zimbabwe. Are you in favour of that?
HAIN: Well what I will
talk about is a British proposal for international observers. It's very
important that the elections that are coming up are free and fair and all
African countries in the region, South Africa for example have invited
international observers in and Zimbabwe has never done that. I think that's
the priority. Our aid programme is very small, very small indeed. It
does virtually .... None of it goes through the government it goes through
non-governmental organisations direct to the anti poverty strategies and
the reason we can't help fund the government is that the policies that
are being pursued do not allow for that because there's no guarantee that
you'd get value for money if you did it.
HUMPHRYS: So that bit which does
go to the government, that should be cut off shouldn't it?
HAIN: Well that could be
looked at.
HUMPHRYS: Will it be?
HAIN: ` It is being looked
at at the present moment. It's very small but in a sense it's part of
an historic package.........
HUMPHRYS: But part of it's a gesture
as well as everything else. It's sending a signal isn't it, that's the
point?
HAIN: Indeed, and I think
in the appropriate circumstances, no doubt Claire Short would want to look
at that, but I think at the moment the priority is fair and free elections,
it's important that that proceeds. Unfortunately the signs are not encouraging
in that respect. There's been a lot of violence, a lot of lawlessness
officially sanctioned if not actually organised by the government from
right at the top.
HUMPHRYS: And there are other signals
you could send as well aren't there such as suspending Zimbabwe from the
Commonwealth, stopping the supply of spare parts for Hawk fighter aircraft
and so on and so on and so on - there's a whole raft of things: freezing
assets overseas, all kinds of things you could do or you should do.
HAIN: In the case of the
Commonwealth of course the Commonwealth's rules don't provide for a country
in Zimbabwe's situation to be suspended, it provides, for example, Pakistan
which has had a military coup or Nigeria previously to be suspended but
I would think that the Commonwealth ministerial action group meeting here
in London next month will discuss Zimbabwe, there's no question about that
unless the situation has radically improved as we hope it will do. These
other measures can also be considered and are under consideration but they're
not in the end addressing the central point; Hawk spares for the use of
a couple of planes in the Congo conflict are not actually anything to do
with getting free and fair elections (both speaking at once) I would have
thought the signals we've sent, as I said earlier to the point of bluntness,
have been very very clear. We do not think that what is happening in Zimbabwe
at the moment, the policies being pursued by President Mugabe, the way
he conducts his diplomatic relations are in the interests of the Zimbabwean
people and that's pretty plain and obvious because the economy has been
declining, there are fuel shortages, there's political instability - what
is needed is good governance in Zimbabwe, the sooner the better.
HUMPHRYS: We were prepared to recall
the High Commissioner over the opening of a British diplomatic bag which
we regarded as a pretty heinous crime. Well he's been doing some much
more heinous things than that over the past weeks and months, yet our High
Commissioner is still there.
HAIN: He is and he's seeking
to engage with the Zimbabwean people and their government to try and encourage
land reform programmes that are serious for instance. We've said we will
help with the land reform programme.....
HUMPHRYS: But frankly the idea
of Mugabe listening to your High Commissioner is just pathetic isn't it
really - he's just not going to is he? He's made it perfectly clear.
HAIN: Well what is important
here is not gesture politics of the kind Francis Maude and the Tories are
demanding and this that and the other. What is important is policies that
work. Now the Americans have shown by withdrawing their support for land
reform that they have effectively imposed a kind of sanctions there. There
are effectively negative sanctions imposed by President Mugabe on his own
country in this sense that the money through the international financial
institutions is there to help but it's the policies and the unwillingness
to reform that is stopping them going in.
HUMPHRYS: If it all goes pear-shaped,
if it gets worse than it is at the moment and we have the spectacle of
many, many thousands of white people, some of them with British passports
wanting to come back to Britain, some of them come to Britain for the first
time and we're talking totally about eighty thousand people, would we say
- 'Yes, the door is open to you'?
HAIN: Well British passport
holders.........
HUMPHRYS: ..... of course they'd
have the right to come.......
HAIN: ....have the right
to come......
HUMPHRYS: Of course, but there
may be another sixty thousand who don't have British passports but who
would say 'well we have connections to Britain...', would we say - 'Yeah,
by all means come.'?
HAIN: No. There's a normal
procedure: If people have or can claim British passports through an ancestor
then obviously they go through that procedure and indeed we have had some
people going through it at the present time but I don't want to anticipate
failure, I want Zimbabwe to succeed, I hope that President Mugabe will
draw back from the brink and encourage free and fair elections and political
stability and then the country can move forward and Britain as I say stands
ready to help.
HUMPHRYS: But it's not very likely
that things are going to go well does it, I mean let's be frank about it.....
HAIN: The signs haven't
been encouraging.......
HUMPHRYS: .....absolutely so therefore
we're going to find an awful lot of people who may well say - 'Britain
is our last hope'.
HAIN: Well I'm not sure
about that because those Zimbabweans, and we're talking mainly about whites
but not exclusively who've been targeted in this way are Zimbabweans.
They're not English or Welsh or Scottish, they want to stay in the country,
they want to contribute, they want to farm, their skills are needed, their
resources are needed and I hope the government will make use of them.
HUMPHRYS: You say it isn't looking
very promising and most people would agree with that assessment but you
appear not to have, as it were, a plan B
HAIN: We've had a very
clear strategy from the time that it was obvious that the situation was
deteriorating to constantly seek to persuade the Zimbabwean government
that in the interests of its own people, different policies are needed.
The priority now, at this historic moment for Zimbabwe, a make or break
time, is to get free and fair elections - that's what we're concentrating
on, that's what everybody should be focussing on.
HUMPHRYS: Peter Hain, thank you
very much indeed.
HAIN: Thank you.
JOHN HUMPHRYS: Local authorities throughout
England are waiting anxiously to find out what sort of future they have.
They're all being assessed by inspectors from OFSTED. Some of them have
had their reports and over the next couple of weeks many more will find
out whether they have come up to scratch. If not... well, they could lose
the powers they now have to run the schools in their areas. As Terry Dignan
reports, more and more money is going directly to the schools... all part
of a Whitehall plot, some say, to cut out the middle man and even to replace
the town hall bureaucrats with businessmen.
TERRY DIGNAN: The day begins for thirteen
year old Kit. Mr Blair expects great things of him and all the other children
attending State schools. The Prime Minister says nothing must impede their
path to academic success. Which is why Local Education Authorities - LEAs
- are being told to relieve schools of the burden of town hall bureaucracy.
While parents are more concerned about what goes on in the classroom rather
than the precise nature of the relationship between a school and its LEA,
increasingly, Labour ministers believe that this relationship is a cause
of children under-achieving. That's why they want other agencies, including
profit-making private companies to take over much of what an education
authority does. According to the Government's critics, this could undermine
local democracy and have potentially catastrophic consequences for schools
in poorer areas. Arriving for morning registration, Kit and his classmates
at Hendon School have been promised the London Comprehensive will strive
to give them a good education. The job of an education authority is to
help teachers achieve that aim. But Kit's head says he doesn't need an
LEA.
BOB LLOYD: I can't think of a single
way yet in which the local authority's done anything to improve the quality
of education or the standards of education within the school and so my
mind is full of questions as to what the role of the local authority is
in this relationship.
DIGNAN: Schools and LEAs should
be on the same side, turning children into rounded individuals. But there
are signs of rivalry. Ministers worry about complaints of too much interference
by education authorities. They want them to stay on the sidelines if a
school is providing children with a good education.
ESTELLE MORRIS MP: Each school has a different
relationship with the LEA and if it's struggling and needs the support
it's got to be closer and hands on but if it can look after itself, it's
got to be at a very much at an arm's length and a monitoring role. It
doesn't mean a visit a week. It doesn't mean a telephone call a month.
It means monitoring the data and the quality of data is such now, that
they can do that without excessive visits.
CHRIS WOODHEAD: Successful schools can manage their
own destiny - I mean they are successful because they can manage their
own destiny. They've got good teachers, committed professionals working
extremely hard; they've got head teachers with vision and drive pushing
things forward; they've got a supportive governing body. I don't think
the LEA is needed in those cases.
DIGNAN: An LEA's role as guardian
of the interests of all children could be hindered, it's argued, if suburban
schools go their own way. It's feared they'll attract the best and the
brightest, leaving schools in deprived areas at a bigger disadvantage.
VALERIE DAVEY MP: Individual schools opting out
in the long term do not benefit their communities - they only benefit themselves
- and indeed, as time goes on, if they become very popular they end up
selecting the young people coming to the school, which is detrimental to
that community as well.
DIGNAN: Graham Lane worries about
a further threat to LEAs. A Labour councillor, he's visiting the new head
of Star primary, in the deprived London borough of Newham. Among Tony Blair's
advisers there are misgivings about the role of councils even in failing
schools. Yet Lane, speaking for English education authorities, says his
council has transformed this school.
COUNCILLOR GRAHAM LANE: The people that are turning schools
round, very quickly at the moment with their new powers from the 1988 Act
are in fact local government and they're being turned round at a faster
rate than ever before. That is because local government sees that as one
of its main duties, to intervene when there's something going wrong.
DIGNAN: Praise for Newham Council
for improving standards in the classroom has come from OFSTED, the body
which now inspects LEAs. But all too often OFSTED reports make for dismal
reading.
WOODHEAD: I don't think that the inspection
evidence either of schools or local authorities leads me to the conclusion
that the local authority is a crucial agent with regard to raising educational
standards. In the worst cases - I mean Hackney, Islington, Liverpool,
Leeds - we found a situation where in our judgement the authority was not
adding any value whatsoever to the work that the schools are doing - indeed
the reverse.
DIGNAN: When OFSTED damns an LEA,
the Government calls in the private sector. There's nothing new in schools
using the private sector. This technology came from big business. But now
even council departments which advise on teaching methods are being handed
over to businesses - or, as some would put it, privatised.
MORRIS: I believe that the LEA
is so important that if it's not delivering you've got to find somebody
who has. So bottom line is, LEAs are important, if they can deliver let
them do it. But if not, let's find another way of providing that service.
DIGNAN: At an education authority
condemned by OFSTED, a visitor from big business arrives. Kevin McNeeny
runs Nord Anglia, a plc which has its eyes on the services of the LEA here
in Labour-controlled Southwark.
KEVIN McNEENY: We are private companies
in education and we've made a success out of our business thus far. We
have made the point for quite a long time that the private sector has something
to contribute to the national campaign to raise standards in schools. So
I'm pleased that the Government has now more fully taken on board the suggestion
that we can contribute.
DIGNAN: Back at Hendon comprehensive,
it's time for Kit's lunch in the privatised cafeteria. The Government believes
schools would also get better value if the core services of education authorities
were run by the private sector. It's one thing to make a profit from providing
lunch, say Labour MPs, it's quite another for businesses to make money
from taking over the LEA.
DAVEY: There is a clear distinction
at the moment between those who are getting involved as a trust, Education
Trust - in other words are not profit, not for profit company - and those
who are clearly going in with the intention in the long run to make a profit
out of state education; and I find that second category completely anathema
to me, personally.
KEVIN McKEENY: We are an education company
and we are genuinely interested in standards in education and when we improve
a school we get a great kick out of it. But we are also a commercial company
and when we offer our services we expect to receive a management charge
for those services.
MORRIS: It's money to people to
provide a service, but the end result is that millions of pounds that's
been badly spent in the past becomes more effective in contributing to
the standards agenda.
DIGNAN: At present elected members
of local authorities are answerable to their electorate for the way in
which education is provided in their area. If the powers of LEA's are swept
away in favour of allowing others including the private sector to meet
the needs of schools and their pupils who then will be accountable for
how education is run locally?
LANE: If local democracy
is not involved in that and you're relying on a private company whose main
interest in the end, and they may have worthy interests about employability
but nevertheless it's still making, making a profit and that's the first
concern, then you have not got the local accountability.
DAVEY: There has to be accountability
for the spending of that money, and more importantly I believe the values
underpinning our education have to be understood and decided democratically.
ACTUALITY. Right. Title is 'Averages
From Frequency Tables'.
DIGNAN: But the Government is trying
to calculate if a new kind of accountability can work in education. Instead
of being answerable for providing services to schools, councils will be
accountable for ensuring others do the providing.
ACTUALITY: "If you laid them all out..."
DIGNAN: In business jargon it's
called outsourcing.
MORRIS: In each of the LEA's where
we've intervened, I've met with all the head teachers. I've gone and spoken
to them and they are so critical of the service that they've been getting
from the local authority. And one of the great things about outsourcing
is it is a commercial contract and for the very first time what the council
does is written down, what the private sector, or the provider is written
down and the Heads know what they get from whom.
DIGNAN: On to drama class to learn
stage fighting. There's no pretence, though, about the attack on LEAs'
powers. Ministers will take failing schools from councils and give these
to businesses too. They'll get extra money and be renamed City Academies
with the aim of achieving standards set by schools like this one. Labour
MPs fear the idea sounds similar to a Conservative creation.
DAVEY: I think if the model were
to be the City Technology Colleges, which took a school outside the LEA
remit and gave it huge extra funding, causing a great deal of animosity
and distrust, that would be disastrous.
DIGNAN: Back in Newham, as parents
wait to collect their children, some councillors feel aggrieved that they
get the blame for schools in poor areas under-performing. They regard City
Academies as a gimmick. And they can't see why the private sector will
make a better job of running them.
LANE: The only way I think
they will turn round failing schools by that method is to get rid of some
of the students and select a new lot which actually isn't, isn't the answer,
you have to turn a school round with the existing students in it.
MORRIS: Those problems have been
there for generation after generation and nobody did a damned thing about
it. So if we're serious about trying to tackle that generational underachievement
in both LEA's and in schools, I just think it would be silly to close our
minds to things that other sectors could bring to us.
DIGNAN: Competitive sport is taken
seriously at Hendon Comprehensive. Ministers would like leaner education
authorities, too. So they are forcing them to pass on to schools ever-larger
slices of their budgets. LEAs say the money's for providing services, an
argument the head here rejects.
BOB LLOYD: Instead of the funding
that the Government are providing for education coming straight to the
school it comes through the local authority and the local authority takes
its cut, about ten to fifteen per cent and I'm continuously having to ask
myself what is it as a school, what is it that the children in this school
are getting from that money the local authority is taking off and I'd have
to say that my answer is that there is nothing that I can detect at all.
DIGNAN: We could be heading for
a system whereby well-managed schools like this one will be left to run
their own affairs with minimal interference. Failing schools could be taken
out of council control altogether. All that will be left for LEAs to do
is to monitor schools' performance - and the services they receive from
the private sector.
WOODHEAD: They shouldn't be over-monitored
by the Local Education Authority - there's got to be a freedom of executive
decision to decide how best to meet the challenges that are there. And
looking to the future, as this Government initiative is developed, I think
the key issue really is how do we ensure that the private sector, as it
takes on these responsibilities, does have a proper freedom of action to
come up with solutions that are genuinely innovative and genuinely helpful
to the schools concerned.
MORRIS: I think if you look right
across local authorities, not just in local education authorities, the
days of LEA's, local authorities delivering themselves all services, they've
gone. They've gone forever.
DIGNAN: The bell goes for the end
of the school day - and possibly the system by which education is currently
run - in England at least. But cutting LEAs out of providing education,
it's argued, will harm the interests of many children.
LANE: What it would result
in would be more and more sink schools emerging, there would be some elite
schools and those would be very good schools, but a lot of people in this
country would not receive the education they should be entitled to do so.
DIGNAN: By the time Kit and his
friends have left school for work or college, local government's role in
education may have been reduced to a minimum. Councillors will complain
about the absence of democratic accountability, but ministers are in little
mood to heed their warnings.
HUMPHRYS: Terry Dignan reporting there.
JOHN HUMPHRYS: Tomorrow is the second
anniversary of the signing of the agreement that was meant to devolve power
to a Northern Ireland assembly, to create a new future for the province
and a permanent peace. But the assembly has been suspended, the Unionists
have imposed new conditions on starting it up again and Sinn Fein have
warned that the end result of all this could be a return to violence. The
chairman of Sinn Fein is Mitchell McLaughlin and he's in our Dublin studio.
Mr McLaughlin, don't you
accept that the only way to break what's now being described as this 'Mexican
stand off' is for both sides, I emphasise both sides, to make concessions?
MITCHELL MCLAUGHLIN: Well John, yes I think both sides
have to stretch themselves even further to understand the difficulties
of each other. From our point of view we have two additional problems
on top of the existing difficulties: one is that it seems to us now manifestly
obvious that David Trimble's difficulties with his own party, the divisions
there, mean that he can't stand over any deal with us and secondly the
actions of Peter Mandelson in taking away political institutions that were
actually voted for by the people of Ireland has knocked a huge hole in
the confidence of the Nationalist community that the British government
will act honourably. So we have to overcome those problems as well as
the other remaining difficulties that were not sorted out at the time of
the Good Friday Agreement itself.
HUMPHRYS: You acknowledge that
Mr Trimble has...in a sense you acknowledged in that answer that he's tried
and failed, I mean he has tried to do something, he's tried to fly a bit
of a flag in Washington last month and he was promptly cut down to size
as a result of it so you really now, the Republican movement really now
has to do something to try and move it forward doesn't it?
MCLAUGHLIN: Yes, and at our party conference
yesterday in the opening address I made this appeal to David Trimble 'Let's
build on the silence of the guns. Let's end the war of words between us
and let's commence if you like the battle for ideas within the political
institutions because it's our view that unless we do, that David Trimble
is actually going to be destroyed by the right wing of his own party.
He may not survive as leader until the end of this year otherwise and I
think his only salvation really is to move into the political institutions
with us and on a good faith basis across the table, let's address those
outstanding problems including disarmament.
HUMPHRYS: Well of course he can't
just move into the political institutions with you without his party saying
so, there is no way his party would say so therefore what you've got to
do is give him some help and what the help you could give would be to make
what is described, and I use the quote 'the unmistakable signal of their
peaceful intentions...', that is that the Republican Movement should offer
an unmistakable signal of their peaceful intentions which would be worth
more than a one-off token gesture and could get it all moving and could
give Mr Trimble what he needs to get back into the institutions with you.
MCLAUGHLIN: Well John, and I want to be
as constructive about this as I can, but the difficulties in David Trimble's
party has to do with the process of political change, equality for Nationalists,
Nationalists and Republicans in government. His difficulties in his party
are not about disarmament of the IRA because David Trimble is saying exactly
what his opponents are saying on that matter, they've introduced the additional
effort of rejecting Patten so it's clear that their rejections will actually
move from one issue to another. The next one quite clearly has been flagged
up to be the Criminal Justice review report that was published by Peter
Mandelson last week, so we can see that the rejectionist wing of Unionism
will simply raise obstacle after obstacle after obstacle. Now if we get
to a point where David Trimble comes into Stormont, tomorrow morning, to
say that 'I know I will not be able to bring that part of my party,' which
is less than half of his party, 'along with me, I know that, but I will
work with those who are progressive within my party' then Sinn Fein will
reciprocate. We could have the Executive back tomorrow afternoon and we
could have the Assembly fully functioning by tomorrow afternoon. It's
as close as that but clearly it is as difficult as that also. We can
only sort this out when we're all round the table and sharing power and
responsibility for each other.
HUMPHRYS: But what you describe
is precisely what David Trimble has actually been doing or trying to do
but of course if he went that extra stage that you're now suggesting without
something behind him, something that he could point to as an achievement,
they will chuck him out of the party as you acknowledged a couple of answers
ago, so the Republican Movement has to give him something, they have to
say, in effect, 'the war is over'.
MCLAUGHLIN: Well John, I'm making this
point that even, even if that was possible, and in my view it isn't possible
and I see no advantage in having a divided Unionist party and a divided
IRA, I don't think that would help the process either. It is my view that
if we deal with the politics and making politics work, that those within
the Unionist community, and they are a majority even if it's a slim majority,
will I think come along with David Trimble and they will give him sustained
support, but I'm not sure whether David Trimble is prepared to take that
gamble. There's support within the Assembly itself from the Alliance party,
from the Women's Coalition, from the Progressive Unionist Party votes to
sustain his position so I think we could have the Executive back but we
know that there are those within Unionism who are not and who will never
be reconciled to this process of change and the British government have
to be aware of that and if there's any strategic thinking at that level,
Peter Mandelson knows that David Trimble's position is weaker today than
it was before the Assembly was suspended by Peter Mandelson. That was
a crucial mistake and it should be reversed by the British government.
HUMPHRYS: But as far as David Trimble
is concerned he is prepared to take great risks with his own party, he
said, and I quote - 'We are prepared to be involved in a fresh sequence...'
in other words to get back into the institutions, presumably, 'that would
not involve arms up front.' So in other words he's saying - 'Come and
meet me halfway. At least give me something to go with'.
MCLAUGHLIN: We have gone to meet him and
we've asked him to explain what he meant by that and we've discovered that
he has reversed himself. Now possibly under pressure from his within his
own party but that which he said in Washington is no longer available to
us, What we find then is that David Trimble is virtually a prisoner of
his right wing and we're saying to him - 'We can't help you with that right
wing. It has to be Unionists saying to fellow Unionists - This way will
not work''. And if David Trimble is asking for certainty, the one certainty
that's available to him is that his approach on IRA disarmament won't work
and it clearly, in terms of the political structure, that approach will
not allow us to get into power sharing or responsibility sharing. I think
David Trimble knows that and let's move back to what we know will work.
HUMPHRYS: But you cannot put the
entire onus on him...
MCLAUGHLIN: ...I'm not..
HUMPHRYS: ...let me remind you
what one of your own former colleagues Danny Morrison said and I quote
again 'in truth the war is over'. Well now, why cannot you yourselves
now, the Republican Movement now say that in terms and then David Trimble
will have something with which he can work and we can get the whole thing
back on track.
MCLAUGHLIN: Well you see if it was that
simple then clearly that would happen. Now the fact that it didn't happen
obliges people like you who I know have taken a clear interest over a long
period. I mean if we have in the North two hundred and forty British security
bases still, six years into a cessation, then clearly nobody on the British
government side either can say that the war is over. But if you look at
where we started six years ago, we had war on our streets, the guns are
silent and let's build on that now by putting in place political institutions
and we will get to the point that you are describing I think very quickly.
HUMPHRYS: If that doesn't happen
Gerry Adams says there could be return to violence but of course there
cannot be a return to IRA violence can there because there is no threat
to the peace process from the IRA, is what Mr Adams has said, so can you
be quite clear this morning that there is no possibility of the IRA returning
to violence?.
MCLAUGHLIN: Well it is my opinion that
what Gerry Adams was describing is that political vacuums in the North
of Ireland have always provided opportunities for those who would resort
to political violence and it has happened time and time again...and he
echoed in his comments the words of the British Prime Minister, Tony Blair
said exactly the same thing and Bertie Ahern the Irish Taoiseach said exactly
the same thing. So we know what the onus is, the onus is on all those with
a mandate, including our party, to get round the table and to discharge
the mandates that they got from the electorate and that does, they make
the institutions work, those that we have already agreed, make them work
and in doing so take away any rationale for anybody, from any section of
our community or indeed the British military establishment to return to
violence.
HUMPHRYS: Mitchell McLaughlin thank
you very much indeed.
MCLAUGHLIN: Thank you very much John.
JOHN HUMPHRYS: On Tuesday a new committee
will be born in the House of Commons. Before you doze off at that exciting
news... you should know that this one could indeed have profound implications
for the way England is governed in the future. It's called the Standing
Committee on the English Regions and it's a direct response to devolution
in Scotland and Wales. But will it be enough to satisfy the growing demands
for greater powers by the regions of England. Iain Watson reports.
IAIN WATSON: Newcastle United are in training
for their big match later today. Many of the footballers successfully combine
the role of national, as well as local, hero. But politics is a funny old
game. Devolution to Scotland and Wales has raised the question of what
to do about England. Reconciling the issue of regional versus national
identity is proving tricky.
DOUG HENDERSON MP: There is a demand in the regions
of England to be able to speak out better for themselves; to be able to
take some of their own decisions in a way that they currently look over
the borders in Scotland and Wales and see the Scots and the Welsh doing.
LOUISE ELLMAN: I think the government is
rather nervous about devolution but I think they have to recognise that
devolution cannot stop part way - it is time for the voice of the English
regions to be heard
WATSON: Newcastle United hope to
bring the FA cup back here to St James's park. But politicians in the North
East say the government should give an additional to boost to local pride.
They are making a play for more powers to be devolved to the English regions;
But the government is moving very cautiously. On Tuesday, a new Standing
Committee on Regional Affairs kicks off. Once established, we could see
attendance records being set for a Commons committee. That's because it
will be open to all 529 MPs who represent English seats. The committee
will give them extra time to Westminster politicians who want to discuss
matters of importance in each region. But here in Newcastle, there is
strong support for a political arena that's much closer to home.
HENDERSON: The demands in the region are
for something in the region so that the region can look after affairs that
it can better manage itself - a body which can represent the region in
both Westminster and indeed in European political corridors. And I don't
think the people in the region, whether they come from the political community
or the economic community, will feel convinced by what the government
proposing in this. I don't think its a bad idea -I just think it's an
idea that won't carry a lot of weight
WATSON: Campaigners for English
devolution hope the new committee will be a preparation for more radical
change. But they don't think it's a fitting a substitute for more local
control over matters like health and education. It may also be too supine
a body to stand up to the powers that be. While every MP from England can
attend, only a small team of core members will have voting rights. Critics
say the government will hold sway.
BOB MCLENNON: It is nothing like regional
government, it is wholly controlled from the centre. The committee will
be chosen by the majority party, as proposed it will be dominated by Labour.
The government appears to be wanting to have a committee of only thirteen
reflecting the composition of the House of Commons as a whole, and not
the political composition of the English members. That would result in
an over-balancing towards Labour. It would also seem that the government
is seeking to control the agenda, and that is really the opposite of what
regional government should be all about.
WATSON: But one aspiring member
of the new committee thinks that it can develop into a strong forum for
regional debate.
STEPHEN LADYMAN: One of the slight weaknesses of
this new committee is of course that the government will be choosing the
topics for debate, and that of course will limit the new committee. but
one of the things of course the core membership of that committee can do,
and the people who are interested in this committee is they can lobby and
campaign and press the government for a variety of debates to take place
in it that will reflect all those different views over a period of time.
WATSON: Sprucing up the English
Regional Committee may appear to some as a bold move, but it doesn't represent
a clean break with the past. It was used, then put away, once before as
part of the last Labour government's failed constitutional reforms. But
it's been kitted out and made ready after private polling suggested the
Conservatives were being seen as the more patriotic of the two main parties.
They're hoping the English question will help them strike at Labour's dominance.
SIR GEORGE YOUNG: We would see the establishment
of an English regional committee as a wholly inadequate response to devolution.
The Scottish parliament has tax raising powers and it can pass primary
legislation. There is no suggestion that the regional assemblies, or indeed
the standing committee, would have similar powers so it's not an appropriate
response to the imbalance in the constitution that has been brought about
by the Welsh Assembly and Scottish Parliament. Our answer is to make the
situation stable and fair, there should be a procedure for English bills
on which only English MPs vote -or, as is more likely, if a bill covers
only England and Wales, only English and Welsh MPs vote,
WATSON: But Labour politicians
say that English people are more concerned about their own regions than
with what happens at Westminster. St James's Park is getting a �50m makeover,
and the government says its Regional Development Agencies will encourage
more investment where it's needed. But backbenchers want to see these work
in partnership with new political structures.
ELLMAN: The government realise
that there is now a ground swell of opinion looking at the English regions,
they know it will not go away, this is a very positive move forward, and
if this is linked together with directly elected regional assemblies it
will be part of a package which will meet the needs that are now being
identified
WATSON: The politics of identity
are never black and white - Tony Blair is both a Newcastle supporter, and
an England supporter. But here in this sports shop in the north east sales
of Newcastle shirts far outstrip those of the national team, and many
Labour politicians are arguing that it's now high time that political
expression is given to this strong sense of regional identity. They say
that post devolution, only elected assemblies will create a level playing
field between the nations and regions of the UK.
HENDERSON: People in the North East are
not Celts, they are not like Scotland or Wales, but they are very different
culturally from the south of England. They have I think a much greater
sense of community spirit which is partly born out of an anti-London thing
but it is there. People co-operate together, the business community co-operates
for instance with the trade union movement and with local government I
think far better than in other areas of the country, and that reflects
a common identity and I think that's the basis of regional government in
the future in areas like the North East and I think the government have
to understand that.
WATSON: These Newcastle supporters
are in good spirits; they're gathering in the Black Horse pub in Whitley
Bay before travelling to London to cheer on their side in today's match.
Most of them have no doubt where to place their loyalties.
MAN: Geordie first, British
second England, really I've no interest in England because England's London,
the South, not up here. I mean possibly where people in the North East
feel let down is obviously we've now got a Labour government, where the
majority of MPs are from the North East and we have been let down because
the first regional vote has been for the Mayor of London which is actually,
personally, I think, quite shocking.
WATSON: Devolution elsewhere in
the UK has encouraged a debate about whether a regional assembly here would
be a good idea.
GIRL: I think so, because
it would have somebody that's local who knows the issues that we've got
in Newcastle, every area has got their different issues, and they can sort
of better know where the money is needed.
WATSON: The locals are mildly disappointed
at Labour's plans. They're being offered evolution, not devolution. Labour's
ruled out an English parliament, but they have said they'd give the regions
their own elected assemblies, where there's a clear demand. But it could
be a long wait. That's because the idea of regional government had fallen
foul of a backroom tactical tussle. When Labour fulfilled their pledge
to create Regional Development Agencies last year, those on John Prescott's
team hoped these would act as a nifty first step towards fully democratic
regional assemblies. But powerful players in Cabinet stood in their way.
A sceptical Prime Minister watched from the sidelines. But, in today's
Observer newspaper, Tony Blair admitted he was wrong to try to rein in
Welsh devolution. Supporters of English regional government think he's
now moving in the right direction.
TONY BLAIR: We can see devolution as a
necessary part of keeping Britain together; more regional decentralisation
in England makes sense.
ELLMAN: The Prime Minister's speech
did open out the opportunity of recognising diversity within the English
regions and in meeting those needs. His comments did recognise that devolution
in Scotland and in Wales, had brought added strength to the United Kingdom
and in saying that I think he opened out the possibility of that same thinking
being applied to opportunities in the English regions.
WATSON: It's Schools cup final
day in Newcastle. St Cuthberts are turning out to take on Heaton Manor.
Watching the match is Ian Mearns, a Gateshead councillor who chairs the
campaign for a north east assembly. He knows that spending on public services
is higher across the border in Scotland and wants the North East to get
a piece of the action. He is far from impressed with the powers that will
be available to the new English regional committee, but he believes that
its very existence could push forward the debate on regional government
and win recognition for the problems of the North.
IAN MEARNS: What I hope will happen will
be that the committee actually comes round the regions and accepts sort
of days within those regions when the MPs from the region can be involved,
as well as the committee members themselves and call to account ministers
for what is or is not happening in those regions where the committee meets.
I would hope that that would be a way to operate because it would actually
bring the government out of central London to the regions themselves.
WATSON: Supporters of regional
assemblies hope the new Committee will focus attention on their demands
and they look to Scotland for inspiration. The last Conservative government
aimed to defend the union by beefing up the Scottish Grand Committee and
taking it round the country. They hoped to deflect calls for devolution,
rather than to give them momentum. But, unwittingly, their strategy rebounded
and demands for devolution grew. In just a couple of hours from now,
Newcastle will take to the pitch here at Wembley to compete in the FA
cup semi final. They will take on the expensively-assembled glamour boys
of Chelsea in a classic North/South clash. Their ultimate goal is to win
this trophy, the FA cup itself. But away from Wembley, in the more rarefied
atmosphere of Westminster, a similar battle could ensue. There are fears
that the new English regional committee will be used by northern politicians
to do a bit of grandstanding. They could use it to argue for more resources
for their regions at the expense of the south.
LADYMAN: There are areas of great
deprivation and poverty in the south east and the south west, those problems
have to be put on the table at this committee. If we don't have a voice
in this committee, those of us from the south, it will fail. We must not
allow ourselves to be drowned out by MPs from the North -if we do that
will be a disaster.
HENDERSON: Everybody looks at their own
back yard in these things and clearly there will be arguments put by southern
interests, northern interests and so on, but I think if a fair system and
a just system is to be brought about then there is a need for change. And
that means that there must be more resources distributed to the poorer
regions of England like the north west and the north east
WATSON: The setting up
of an English regional committee this week could kick start a whole series
of contentious debates. And as devolution to London, Wales and Scotland
has proved, Labour's ambitious programme of constitutional reform has put
them under unforeseen pressure. The question now is whether the new committee
will create more problems than it solves.
HUMPHRYS: Iain Watson reporting
there and that's it for this week and indeed for the next three weeks -
it's the London Marathon next Sunday and then Easter of course. We'll
be back after the Easter break. Until then, good afternoon.
....oooOOOO...
24
FoLdEd
|