BBC On The Record - Broadcast: 08.10.00



==================================================================================== 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: 08.10.00 ==================================================================================== JOHN HUMPHRYS: Good afternoon. Anne Widdecombe could scarcely have expected such an adverse reaction as there's been to her controversial policy on drugs. Has the mood among the politicians changed? Why are there so few black MP's in the House of Commons, we'll be addressing that question. And we'll be talking to the man who could be the next leader of the Ulster Unionists? That's after the news read by Peter Sissons. NEWS HUMPHRYS: Anne Widdecombe was cheered by the Tory faithful when she said: let's get tougher on soft drugs. But, although she won the applause, it seems she's losing the argument. Britain's ethnic minorities may be successful in many areas of society ... but why are they so few in the House of Commons? We'll also be talking to the leaders of the Labour and Conservative groups in the European Parliament. What do THEY think of Tony Blair's plans to "take Europe closer to the people"? JOHN HUMPHRYS: But first Northern Ireland. David Trimble was in a defiant mood yesterday when he talked to the annual conference of his Ulster Unionist Party. He has no intention either of resigning as party leader or of walking away from the Good Friday Agreement which, once again, is in so much trouble. But can he really hold on and the can the agreement survive? Jeffrey Donaldson is perhaps the biggest thorn in his side - certainly on of them - an MP who thinks the agreement is fatally flawed. He wants to return to the party's policy of "no guns... no government" and he does NOT want the Royal Ulster Constabulary to be changed in the way the British government intends. Mr Donaldson is in our Belfast studio. Good afternoon Mr Donaldson. JEFFREY DONALDSON: Good afternoon John. HUMPHRYS: Mr Trimble made a very powerful appeal yesterday for support for the peace process as it now stands, did he win you over? DONALDSON: Well a lot of things have happened this week John. Earlier in the week we had David Trimble's confession in The Daily Telegraph newspaper that the agreement itself was riddled with constructive ambiguity and that if he knew now..if he had known then what he knows now about the agreement it wouldn't have signed up to it. So clearly I think there is now a consensus within the party that the agreement is deeply flawed and what I'm suggesting is that we need to address those flaws, because if we continue on the path we've embarked, this process is going to fail and we don't want to see that happening in terms of the decommissioning of terrorist weapons. I think we've got to address that issue, we've got to address the problems in relation to the policing debate and these things have got to be looked at and that's why I and others are proposing in the aftermath of the South Antrim by-election and something that was an electoral disaster for the party, that we need to address these issues and do so quickly. HUMPHRYS: Well you may well be right about there being flaws in the agreement, I suspect most people would probably agree with you but the fact is, as Mr Trimble makes very clear indeed, there is nowhere else to go. You don't have a plan B so if the agreement falls and you walk out of the assembly for instance, then that is the end of that isn't it, you are back ultimately to direct rule in Ulster, the end of devolved government in Northern Ireland. DONALDSON: The process will fail John unless we address these issues. It's failing at the moment, is anyone seriously suggesting that we've made progress on the decommissioning of terrorist weapons because we haven't... HUMPHRYS: You have a government in Northern Ireland that seems to be working... DONALDSON: We have got a debate on the policing issue which threatens to up end the whole process, the IRA and Sinn Fein are threatening to walk away if they don't get their way on the policing debate, well, you know, these are matters that need to be addressed and done so properly. There's been a tendency in the past to brush them to one side, not to meet them head on and I think they have to be met head on. They've got to be addressed. I'm not talking about pulling the whole edifice down, what I am saying is that the foundations are so fundamentally weak that it's going to fall down unless we sort out the foundations that are deeply flawed. HUMPHRYS: You say it's failing at the moment but look at what you actually have now that you didn't have before it all began. You do have an IRA ceasefire imperfect admittedly, but you have it, you do have devolved government, you do have an assembly that is working, you are sitting alongside Sinn Fein, something that would have been unthinkable at government level in Northern Ireland until very recently. If you now abandon the process, you say you don't want to bring it all down but if you do move away from the Northern Ireland agreement, then you are back where you started aren't you. DONALDSON: Well John I think you've given a very one-sided view of the agreement. We also have all of the terrorist prisoners released, we also have an amnesty granted by the government to terrorist prisoners on the run. We also have the dismantling of the Royal Ulster Constabulary, we also have violence on our streets. We also have an increase of criminality on our streets, the terrorist organisations have increased their activity not reduced it at that level. We also have the IRA running guns from America, so you know we have got a lot of things there and you can paint a rosy picture but I think that masts the reality that underneath that there are very deep problems that haven't been addressed and that's what people want. That's what the people of South Antrim want, that's why they sent a protest, a very clear protest message that this process, at least in terms of a Unionists perspective is one-sided, it is about appeasing a very violent minority and the Unionist Community does not see that it has gained significant benefits from this agreement, it sees that it is unbalanced and that the benefits have been for the IRA more than anyone else. HUMPHRYS: The danger though, if you go down the path that you seem to be suggesting, is that Unionism is sidelined and that you will see London and Dublin sorting things out for themselves, you will be sitting there watching it happen. DONALDSON: Well I heard what Peter Mandelson said earlier this week and I wasn't impressed by his scaremongering, hints of joint authority. If Peter Mandelson really believes that some form of joint authority over Northern Ireland is going to bring peace and stability, then I think he is fooling no-one only himself. What we've got to do is recognise that there are flaws in this process that need to be addressed and unless they are addressed, the process will collapse John, or else when we come to the next election, what happened in South Antrim will be repeated right across Northern Ireland and where will the Unionist Party be then and what value will the Unionist Party be to this process if it's left electorally decimated. HUMPHRYS: But let's look at what you probably regard as the greatest flaws and that is the fact that the IRA hasn't given up any guns or Semtex or anthing else, no decommissioning at all. You had said that another inspection of the IRA's arms dumps will not do you, that won't not satisfy you. Mr Trimble says there is no chance that you are going to get real decommissioning, actual handing over of weapons unless you stay in the Good Friday Agreement. DONALDSON: Well we haven't had any real decommissioning after two and a half years of the Good Friday Agreement. Decommissioning under the Agreement was supposed to have been completed in May this year, after two years, well we're now two and a half years on and no decommissioning. What I am saying is clearly this method hasn't worked, so far, within the agreement and given that that is undermining confidence in the agreement, particularly in the Unionist community, then we need to do something about that, that's all that I am saying. We've got to address the failure of the paramilitaries to honour their obligations under the agreement. They can't have it both ways, John, there reaches a point in this process, and I think it's now, where we have to say to the paramilitaries, look, you've had the benefits, you've taken the concessions and you've pocketed them, but you haven't delivered the peace that the people of Northern Ireland want and were promised, were promised under this agreement. Now, you've got to honour your obligations, you must make a choice, there is a path before you that is the democratic path and if you choose that path there is a place there for you, but if you choose to continue with your violence and your violent activities and your gun running and your criminality, then you cannot walk the democratic path exclusively, you can't have it both ways. They must make a choice and they've got to be faced up to that choice. HUMPHRYS: So when you say faced up to it, can I be clear about something, as far as decommissioning is concerned. Are you saying that there ought to be a deadline, set for the start of that decommissioning process, the start of actual decommissioning, that you will put that proposal before your ruling body, the council, the Ulster Unionist council and that if there is no beginning of decommissioning by the time that that deadline expires, then you should walk out of the executive. Is that what you are saying, can I be clear about that, if so when is the deadline going to be? DONALDSON: Well we had a deadline and it was in May this year and it passed and there was no decommissioning. I'm not convinced John that deadlines in that sense will work. What I think is needed is that in this process, Unionists made it clear, that we cannot sustain a position where we're sitting in government with Sinn Fein, IRA, bearing in mind that Martin McGuinness, who Ken Macguinness, my colleague, described as the 'Godfather of Godfathers' is now the minister of education in the government of Northern Ireland. Now we can't sustain that position in the absence of decommissioning by the IRA. They're not disarming - they're re-arming. They're engaged in violent activities. They're engaged in murder on the streets. HUMPHRYS: So if not a deadline - what? DONALDSON: Well I'm not going to announce our proposals on this programme in advance of the Ulster Unionist Council meeting. I will give the delegates at the Ulster Unionist Council the opportunity to consider the proposals that we will put forward to them. It will be, I believe, a viable alternative to the way in which this process is proceeding at the moment and I believe that it is a way in which we can address the flaws in the Agreement and we can address how we can move forward. I want to see a positive move forward. I'm not in the business of seeing us return to the past. I want to see progress but it's got to be progress based on firm foundations where there is a clear understanding and expectation that the paramilitaries will actually deliver on their side of the bargain. HUMPHRYS: But those proposals are not going to be acceptable to your leader David Trimble are they? DONALDSON: Well we don't know that. What I would like to see is a consensus within the party on how we go forward. At the moment that consensus doesn't exist. If I were the leader of a party that was split down the middle and was in the electoral mess that the Unionist Party is in at the minute, I'd want to see what I could do about rebuilding the consensus instead of simply pushing ahead with a policy that doesn't achieve a consensus, that is out of favour with the electorate and is failing. I would want to see if there were ways in which I could restructure that policy and that's what we're suggesting and I hope actually that we can persuade David Trimble that there is value in the proposals that we will put forward. HUMPHRYS: We know that David Trimble's not up for any sort of restructuring the sort of thing you've described. He's made that clear time and time again. The SDLP is not up for that sort of restructuring. Sinn Fein is not up for that sort of restructuring. DONALDSON: Well we don't know that John. We don't know that for certain after all we've had previous reviews of the Agreement and the party's participated in those reviews and at the end of the day we as a party have got to consider our approach to this agreement. The SDLP have sat on the fence throughout all of this process. They've taken no risks. I think we're entitled to know from the SDLP what they're prepared to do to put pressure on the paramilitaries. I think we need to know from the governments what they're prepared to do as well. The responsibility shouldn't rest solely with the Ulster Unionist Party, that's absolutely right. There's a responsibility on others to do their bit to address the flaws that are there and that are failing the people of Northern Ireland. HUMPHRYS: Well I can tell you one thing as you well know that the SDLP is not prepared to do and that's countenance any watering down the Pattern proposals for the reform of the RUC, I mean that's just the beginning of it. DONALDSON: Well then we're going to end up with proposals that do not command widespread community support and actually if you read the Belfast Agreement, that's what is stated: That there would have to be proposals for policing that could command widespread community support and it is clear that the Unionist Community does not support the proposals in the Pattern Report, so we don't have that consensus and what we're going to do is simply replace one set of grievances with another set of grievances and the result will be that we don't have what we desire and that is a proper police system for Northern Ireland and I think actually the Royal Ulster Constabulary, given its professional reputation throughout the world can form the basis of a police service in Northern Ireland and that's why I'm against many of the proposals that have been put forward. I think they're unnecessary and they're simply about pandering to the whim of the Republican Movement. HUMPHRYS: Given that David Trimble does not support you in the things you've been saying today, quite apart from the RUC where you may have a degree of agreement, but given that on the broad front he is not going to say - 'yeah, I'll go along with Jeffrey Donaldson on all of that', do you believe that he ought to be challenged for the leadership and if there were a contest would you feel, yourself, obliged to stand? DONALDSON: Well I'm not sure that I accept your premise for that question John. After all, David Trimble said yesterday in his speech to the party conference that he wasn't prepared to wait another three months for decommissioning - now what does that imply? Does that mean that he too, as he said in May this year when he went to the Ulster Unionist Council, that he would be prepared to walk away from the executive if decommissioning didn't occur. So don't conclude that there isn't a possibility that the party will achieve a consensus on walking away (both speaking at once). HUMPHRYS: But he has accused you of undermining the party. I mean that's a pretty powerful accusation to make. It doesn't sound like consensus to me. DONALDSON: Well it is a pretty powerful accusation. I don't think I've undermined the party. When I was up in South Antrim talking to people on the doorsteps it wasn't me they were putting the blame on, it wasn't me they were saying got it wrong with regard to the Agreement, wasn't me who they were saying made the mistakes on decommissioning, on policing, on prisoner releases - it wasn't me they were pinning the blame on. HUMPHRYS: So would you challenge him, and if not you - who? Will you challenge him? DONALDSON: I don't think this is about personalities. And actually I think it demeans the debate, the seriousness of the debate that has to take place within unionism, by reducing it to the level of personality. What I think is important is that we address the flaws that are there in the agreement, that we address our approach to the agreement, our policy with regard to key issues like decommissioning, that's what's important at this time, not personality.... HUMPHRYS: But if Mr Trimble continues to resist the sort of changes that you want made will there be a challenge? DONALDSON: I don't think that that's in the offing. I think that what needs to happen is that the Ulster Unionist council meets and considers its policy and takes decisions on these key issues. There won't be a debate at the next meeting of Ulster Unionist council about who should be the leader and I think that's absolutely right. These issues are far too important for that. HUMPHRYS: Jeffrey Donaldson, many thanks. DONALDSON: Thank you. HUMPHRYS: There are nine black and Asian MP's in the House of Commons. If their numbers reflected the population of this country there would be forty. All nine of them are from one party ... Labour. This week the Commission for Racial Equality will produce a report that says that situation cannot be allowed to continue.... and there are plenty of LABOUR MP's who agree with that. As Terry Dignan reports, they want tougher action to get more black and Asian people into parliament. TERRY DIGNAN: It's a big night at London's Hilton Hotel. More than six hundred guests are arriving for a dinner to celebrate the achievements of Britain's ethnic minorities. Awards are to be presented to those who've had an outstanding year in their chosen career or profession. It's further evidence that many blacks and Asians are breaking the glass ceiling. But in politics it's a different story. If tonight's dinner had been to celebrate the success of Britain's ethnic minorities in politics, the organisers might have chosen a much smaller venue. For while there are many black and Asian success stories in the arts, entertainment, business, the professions, the public sector, in politics, it seems, the barriers have still to come down. The Labour Party argues, in truth, that it's record is much superior to that of the other main parties. Yet the fact remains that many black and Asian members of the Labour Party feel deeply let down. Tonight's hosts, the Asian Marketing Group, have invited big name employers who've promised ethnic minorities equal treatment. If party leaders followed this policy, there'd be forty non-white Members of Parliament. In fact, there are less than a dozen and although they represent Labour, the party's record receives faint praise. DIANE ABBOTT: We have a much better record than the other parties, but that's nothing to boast about. I was elected thirteen years ago. Progress since then has been pitifully slow. TREVOR PHILLIPS: There is a tendency to say, 'Well, if we wait a bit longer, if people work a bit harder, it will happen". But the truth of the matter is for two generations, black and Asian people have been coming forward but not being selected. VALERIE VAZ I think we should change a system if it isn't working, and we know it isn't working now so we have to look at different ways. DIGNAN: Our society is multiracial but you wouldn't think so from looking at our three main parties. In the House of Commons, out of six hundred and fifty-nine MPs only nine - all Labour - are from ethnic minority communities. In Scotland's new parliament not one of its a hundred and twenty-nine members are black or Asian. There are none in the sixty-member Welsh assembly. There are only two, both Labour, in the twenty-five strong Greater London Assembly. In the European Parliament there are only four - two Labour and two Conservative - among the eighty-four members from England, Scotland and Wales. So out of nearly a thousand seats, only fifteen are held by ethnic minority representatives. Of these thirteen are Labour and two Conservative. The Liberal Democrats have none. Valerie Vaz has been trying for fourteen years to become a Labour MP. Persuading members of local constituency parties to select her for a winnable seat has so far proved impossible. In her attempts to get to Westminster she's often competing against white candidates who already wield considerable local influence. Few blacks and Asians have this kind of clout. VAZ: You may come across, what's known as the favoured son, and they will have links with the council, and there may be sort of like deals done, which will favour them, and people will feel they owe them certain things to support them, rather than support someone from the outside. DIGNAN: Trevor Phillips has at least got elected to one of the new devolved bodies, the Greater London Assembly, which is currently holding a black history exhibition. He says constituency activists - who are mainly white - look for a Parliamentary candidate who has a record of campaigning for the party. They ignore the kind of campaigning experience gained by blacks and Asians. PHILLIPS: For black and Asian people who've been active in campaigns which have nothing to do with party politics, but may be immigration or something like that, they don't quite have the credentials that are recognised by the Labour Party at the moment. Now that's a problem, and it's our problem. DIGNAN: In Tower Hamlets a board is elected to decide how a local estate should be regenerated. This part of London's inner city has a large ethnic minority presence in the local Labour Party. They wanted a black or Asian candidate at the last election. They chose Oona King who says she would have had little chance in a constituency party dominated by whites. OONA KING: Overwhelmingly when there are black candidates there, they will vote for the white candidate again and again and again. That's because overwhelmingly you know, on the whole, the majority of Labour party members in most of the seats are white and often you vote with your friends or who you're familiar with. It doesn't mean you're racist. But it does mean that there can be institutional racism, that prevents one group from getting elected. DIGNAN: All but one of Britain's non-white MPs won their seats in multiracial areas like this one. Is the refusal of white members of the Labour Party to select black candidates in other areas more than just institutional racism? SHAMIT SAAGAR: I think what is taking place in the Labour Party like other parties, is a form of imputed racism. That is to say, selectors who are mainly white, are taking the view that whilst they are not racist, and do not discriminate against black and Asian candidates, their fear is - entirely unfounded by the way - that voters will discriminate on that basis, and for those reasons, selectors play safe and shy away from adopting black and Asian candidates, particularly in marginal seats. VAZ: Sometimes it is used as a factor. There are - I mean it's like everything. When you look at a candidate, you look at what their characteristics are and, and it has been used as a factor. DIGNAN: Race has been used as an argument against selecting you? VAZ: It has been mentioned yes. DIGNAN: It's hardly surprising that ambitious black and Asian members of the Labour Party should gravitate to inner city seats like this one. Understandably they feel they've a better chance of being selected for these constituencies. Some fear though this could lead to the ghettoisation of British politics with white MPs representing mainly white areas and black and Asian MPs representing mainly ethnic minority areas. PHILLIPS: I think people have got to be realistic. First of all, seats like Tottenham, say, want a black MP. But you know, white people in Tottenham felt like they wanted a black MP. They had a good experience with Bernie Grant, and I think they'll have an excellent one with David Lammy. Secondly, if someone from an ethnic minority background goes for a seat like Southall or Perry Barr, or indeed Tottenham, there is no worry in anybody's mind that what they're going to do is lose votes because of their colour. DR SAAGAR: One has fostered a mentality that black and Asian candidates are only suitable, are only plausible and only legitimate in such inner city areas containing large numbers of minority voters. Where does that then leave the aspiring black or Asian candidate who seeks to represent constituencies that are predominantly white in terms of their social make-up? If we don't tackle this question, if the Labour Party doesn't address it, ultimately we are in a sense going down the road of assuming that same ethnicity candidates are by definition a good thing. That whites will be represented by whites and non whites by non whites. And there can be very few people in modern multi cultural Britain, who'd actually think that's a desirable end in itself. DIGNAN: As the electorate becomes ethnically more diverse, an iron law of politics becomes clearer. Britain's ethnic minorities vote overwhelmingly Labour. In 1979 eighty-six per cent supported the party, eight per cent the Conservatives and six per cent the Liberal Democrats and others. Nearly twenty years later, according to research, little had changed with eighty-five per cent backing Labour, eleven per cent the Conservatives and four per cent the Liberal Democrats and others. Increasingly, there are demands on Labour to repay this loyalty by selecting more ethnic minority candidates for winnable seats. DR SAAGAR: On the one hand the Labour party has profited enormously in the course of a quarter century, from effectively owning the lion share of the ethnic minority vote. On the other hand, some in the black and Asian community argue what precisely has been the dividend, the pay off, in response to that close relationship between minority voters and the Labour party. DIGNAN: The employers who attended last Tuesday's dinner say they want more job applicants from ethnic minority communities. Labour says it wants the same. Yet when they do put their names forward, many fail to get selected because, it's argued, not enough training is given to them on how to perform effectively when they are called for interview by party officials. PHILLIPS: What we know from business and from other organisations is that when you go through that rather rigorous, that demanding selection procedure you do have to be properly prepared for it. You do have to understand the culture of that kind of selection. And I think that to some extent, people who come up from the black and ethnic minority communities, often aren't quite as prepared as other kind of candidates are. KING: Well training and advice is always very helpful, but it's not going to get you the votes if people have got a favoured candidate who has been around for twenty odd years. VAZ: We've sort of been out-trained really. We've done as much training as we possibly can and we're there ready as good candidates and good MP material. So I think for some people they feel that we're there. We don't need any more training. DIGNAN: London like other cities has a growing ethnic minority population but few ethnic minority MPs. One answer would be to set targets for selecting black and Asian candidates. Yet there's disagreement over this suggestion, too. PHILLIPS: For example, in London, if we were to reflect the population of London, or the population that votes labour, we would find that something like forty, forty-five per cent of labour MPs should be black or Asian or Chinese. And that would mean, twenty to twenty five. The point of setting a target is that party members know that's where we're going. And when they come to cast their votes, they will have in the back of their mind, that we've got to reach this target. KING: You can have as many targets as you want. If you don't have a system that is capable of delivering that, it really doesn't mean anything. It's just hot air. So, although I would say yes, it's important that people know what we're aiming for, common sense should tell you that. You know I don't think it will make that much difference. DIGNAN: At the offices of Operation Black Vote there's growing frustration at what is seen as Labour's timidity. Campaigners here are trying to persuade all the parties to select more ethnic minority candidates for winnable seats. They believe Labour could take the lead by discriminating, for a limited period only, in favour of blacks. WOOLLEY: We shouldn't be afraid to discuss a time-limited positive discrimination. I've been to America and I've seen black judges, black mayors, black congressmen, playing a role at the highest level. Why? because the political will was there, and they used positive discrimination to ensure that their democracy reflected the people that it served. So let's be bold and let's be brave. DIGNAN: Black activists at Labour conferences in the eighties argued for positive discrimination with a demand for black-only shortlists to select candidates. ABBOTT: All-white parties in multiracial constituencies - that's apartheid. DIGNAN: The party rejected the idea yet later imposed all women shortlists. ABBOTT: I think the party has to bite the bullet and do what we were demanding fourteen, fifteen years ago and go for all black shortlists. It is all women shortlists that improved sharply the numbers of women, and you're gonna need that to put up the numbers of black and Asian candidates. You have to remember that New Labour inherited a policy for women's shortlists, as kind of one of the left wing policies of the eighties which people like me were successful in pushing. When we got knocked back by the industrial tribunal, which deemed the shortlists illegal, leadership did nothing about it. Now belatedly, they're talking about changing the law to make all women shortlists legal and that opens the door for all black shortlists as well. KING: I think the party has to consider black only short-lists. My gut instinct is that I don't like them. My gut instinct also is that one thing I dislike even more, is the fact that we don't have a representative democracy. That's very important to me. You know my gut instinct is I don't like women only short lists. But, they are the best and the only mechanism we've had to right a very long wrong that's been going on for a thousand-odd years. So, if you're actually going to try and change the system, then you do have to take some very tough measures. DIGNAN: Some fear the party leadership would only pick seats with large ethnic minority populations for all-black shortlists. There'd then be less pressure to select non-white candidates for other seats. PHILLIPS: I'm really against the idea of colour-coding constituencies because that essentially means that we are shut out of ninety-five per cent of the possibilities. You would not get the situation for example that you've got in Gloucester where we have Parmagit Singh Gunder an Asian candidate, who's won you know, on his own merits in a seat which is, has a very small proportion of ethnic minorities. ABBOTT: All black shortlists would ensure black and Asian MPs everywhere not just in ghetto areas. And just as with all women shortlists, the women were just as good and just as able as the men, the black and Asian MPs will be just as good and able as anybody. DIGNAN: It's unlikely there'd be time to impose all-black shortlists before these voters next go to the polls. So the party is facing demands to impose minority candidates in seats where the sitting Labour MP decides to stand down just as the election is called. VAZ: There has been a precedent in the past when you come near an election, for people with a track record to be put in to seats, and, and I don't see any problem with that. And so I think that would be a good way of showing that the party wants more ethnic minority candidates in parliament, by saying, look, we'll put you through a by-election panel because you have a track record, and then put you in to seats. DIGNAN: After winning the last election Tony Blair admitted there were too few black and Asian MPs in Parliament. TONY BLAIR: We can't be a beacon to the world unless the talents of all the people shine through. Not one black High Court judge. Not one black Chief Constable or Permanent Secretary. Not one black army officer above the rank of Colonel. Not one Asian either. Not a record of pride for the British Establishment and not a record of pride for a British Parliament that there are so few black and Asian MPs. DIGNAN: Three years on, and there's frustration that there's been little in the way of action to match the rhetoric. WOOLLEY: If he passionately believes in it, then he has to ensure, that his troops deliver on the representation front, they haven't and the responsibility lies with him. KING: I want Number Ten to look at these issues. I want the Labour Party to set up a commission, to look at these issues. Tony Blair has said that he will be involved, that Number Ten will be involved. We need to look at this from the very top of the party, because we are committed to greater representation for all groups but we haven't been able to get past the system, which trips you up every time. VAZ: The numbers show that we're not coming through in this way, so there's got to be another way, they've got to look at different ways. And they have over the years tried to make it much more equal and much more fairer and I think they're going to have to look at it again. DIGNAN: The prizes in our society are no longer monopolised by the majority. Politics, though, remains hard to break into. Labour has a better record than the others. Yet many believe it represents a poor return on the loyalty shown to the party by Britain's ethnic minorities. HUMPHRYS: Terry Dignan reporting. JOHN HUMPHRYS: Even by her own fiery standards, Ann Widdecombe raised a real storm when she made her speech to the Tories in Bournemouth last week. She said that a much tougher approach should be taken against people who possess or use soft drugs such as cannabis. They should be fined and end up with a criminal record. Well that brought the wrath of the liberal establishment down on her head but not only the liberal establishment. Many of her own colleagues in the Tory Party were horrified. This morning we discover from the Mail on Sunday that seven members of the Shadow Cabinet no less have admitted they tried smoking a bit of pot when they were youngsters. What's interesting about all is that the tone of the debate, though the drugs seem to be changing, no so long ago we'd have seen enormous political support for such a hard-line. So have things changed, well previous few MPs are prepared to argue for a positively liberal approach on soft drugs, one of those who is is the Labour MP Paul Flynn and he's in our Cardiff studio, and we're joined on the phone by the Conservative MP Julian Brazier, sorry we didn't have time to get you into a studio Mr Brazier, but are you one of those, I'm tempted to say, rare breed of Tories who seem, who support Ann Widdecombe down the line on this? JULIAN BRAZIER MP: Well John, I don't support this particular measure very enthusiastically but I do support the principle that something has to be done. Yesterday morning I had at my constituency surgery a frightened family with two young children. The house next door to them has a tenant who shares it with seven or eight others all of whom take drugs, mostly cannabis, but from time to time they throw their needles over the fence, and people from leafy suburbs can raise their noses at Ann, but they have to say what are their answers to the problems? HUMPHYRS: Well she's offered one hasn't she and that's to say, let's effectively, let's criminalise anybody who uses a bit of pot or something, but you are saying that you don't go that far? BRAZIER: Well it is of course already criminal, what she was proposing was a minimum of a hundred pound fine and no more cautions. That's an idea which she suggested we trail and by all means let's trial it. It may be that a different approach is needed but the present situation in which the drug culture which starts with soft drugs is taking over parts of our inner cities needs to be tackled and that's why so few Labour MPs are willing... because they represent most of the inner city seats, are willing to speak out in favour of liberalising cannabis. HUMPHRYS: Well Paul Flynn, you are one of those who does. Are you a bit surprised, as think many people are by the lack of support, or outspoken support at any rate, for Ann Widdecombe. PAUL FLYNN: No, I think the public opinion has moved on and I believe the taboo has now been broken. The first two Tory MPs who spoke out in this way a couple of years ago had their mouths bandaged by the whips and they weren't allowed to mention the subject again. But now we've got more truth, more honesty and I believe they are going to have a fair debate. The problem that Julian refers to is the present situation and I am against what is happening now but it's the result of Britain having the so-called toughest policies in Europe. We jail more people, we punish them more severely than anywhere else, that why we've got the problems that we have now. And I've written to Tony Blair and said Tony, when we go to the country, we'll have a great deal to boast about but one thing we will be ashamed of, is that when we leave office, like every other government since the war, there will be more deaths from drugs in Britain, than there were when we came into office. And I want to make this charge as serious as I can, I believe that the result of the ignorance, the prejudice, the cowardice of British politicians, because of that people are dying. And in the next ten years I believe there will be at least a thousand avoidable deaths in Britain from heroin because the British politicians have refused to see that the argument that prohibition is the problem, it hasn't be recognised. That's happened in Holland. In Holland they decriminalised cannabis, soft drugs, twenty years ago. The result is that there's less use of soft drugs there and they are often used in a safer way than they are here. But the dramatic success of that is that they have separated the two markets and the hard drug deaths are a tenth of what they are here. Forty people per million die in Britain from heroin use, it's less than four and we've got to realise that what we are doing at the moment, is throwing the majority of our young people into a market of soft drugs that's run by criminals, people who are totally irresponsible. The best way to solve the problem is to collapse that market by replacing it by a market that can be legalised, licensed, policed, controlled, that will reduce all drug use. HUMPHRYS: But there is a big difference isn't there, between what you have just talked about and between turning a blind eye as we are at the moment. FLYNN: Well yes, we've got decriminalisation on a completely irrational scale... HUMPHRYS: But the point I'm making though is that you are not actually winning the argument are you because what you are talking about is something much more liberal. FLYNN: But the Daily Telegraph of all papers, where seventy-six per cent of their readers are saying they disagree with Ann Widdecombe, but the public are far in advance of opinion than the politicians are and I believe that now we can say in parliament, for goodness sake, the majority of politicians have probably used cannabis at one time, it wasn't any great thing, it's nothing like as dangerous as alcohol or tobacco or maybe medicinal drugs, why do we allow this black market to continue to poison and corrupt our young people. Decriminalisation will reduce drug use. HUMPHRYS: Julian Brazier, isn't that a fair point? BRAZIER: I don't really share Paul's view of the picture in Holland. I mean the French perspective, as was reported a couple of years ago rather widely in the papers of Holland, is that under the Shenngin arrangement they've got real problems with drugs now coming across the border from Holland. The central issue really is this: Is the best way to tackle the hard drugs culture to liberalise soft drugs as Paul proposes or is it to find another way to try and persuade people not to get involved in drugs at all? HUMPHRYS: What's the other way, that's the trick isn't it. I mean what is the other way? BRAZIER: Well I think we should have much more in the way of programmes in schools, I also think... HUMPHRYS: ..tried it... BRAZIER: ...I also think though, we have to look at ways of breaking up the culture in the inner cities. I mean I have advocated in the past looking at housing policy. In some states in America if you are convicted of a drug offence, certainly if you are convicted more than one of a drug offence you can get evicted from your house. That would provide a real disincentive of the kind of people who are ruining the lives of many young families and elderly people in the middle of my constituency. HUMPHRYS: Isn't - Paul Flynn, isn't this the thing that you have not tried everything yet, at least this is the argument, you haven't tried everything yet, try and few more things before you... FLYNN: Everything that Julian has suggested has been tried for forty years in America. They have drug education, they bombed and defoliated the drugs fields, they even put drug offenders into prison for longer terms than murderers in some states in America, but nothing has worked. Prohibition is the problem and prohibition like the prohibition of alcohol, builds up an empire of crime and allows the customers of prohibition which is the majority of young people to be exploited. On the question of Europe, I spent a large part of last year as the rapporteur for the Health Committee of the Council of Europe making a comparison between drug outcomes in the forty countries in the Council of Europe and the result of that is Britain is the worst - can we get this through - will Julian see himself as a British politician as responsible for the terrible number of deaths we have here. The Dutch government have just had a debate in which they have voted to strengthen their decriminalisation policies there, they want more decriminalisation there because the evidence is there, incontrovertible, that cannabis use goes down if you decriminalise it, you take away the attraction of forbidden fruit, you take away the attraction of illegality, young people don't use it in the same way but it means that young people can have their experiments with soft drugs without being pressurised by people in the illegal hard market and they don't become addicted to drugs. The evidence is overwhelming. HUMPHRYS: Okay, Mr Brazier, it does seem, doesn't it, can I just ask you this point, we don't have too long, he - Paul Flynn - seems to be winning this argument doesn't he, even with your own Shadow Cabinet. I mean you saw what we saw this morning in the newspapers. BRAZIER: Well I'd only say this, as far as I know there's nobody in the Shadow Cabinet who wants to decriminalise drugs. To return to the America point, a generation ago America's inner cities were by far the worst in the world, the crime rate in some small American cities was more than entire countries in Europe. With the kinds of approaches they have adopted now, their crime rates have dropped in many parts of America and in some parts are lower than many categories than in many European countries. Holland isn't a country that I would offer as an example in a whole string of different ways and the problems that their neighbours are having with the liberalisation in Holland indicates that, What I am the first to say that we've got to recognise our approach to drugs in the past hasn't worked but I do think we should look at some of the experiments in America where whole states have made very substantial progress in coping with this. HUMPHRYS: Thanks very much. Paul Flynn, should the cabinet now do the same as a large chunk of the shadow cabinet has done this morning and tell us whether they have tried pot or not? FLYNN: I wish they would. We know that Alan Duncan as advocated the legalisation of all drugs. We know that David Prior has advocated the decriminalisation of cannabis and said that he has used it. All we want is for politicians to do something that they rarely do - tell the plain honest truth and let's have a proper debate. HUMPHRYS: Paul Flynn, Julian Brazier, thank you both very much indeed. JOHN HUMPHRYS: Tony Blair made an important speech on Europe on Friday. It was a bit overshadowed by the events in Belgrade but what he was saying was that the European Union is out of touch with what people in the member states want. What's raised a few eyebrows is his solution. Mr Blair wants to send even more politicians to Brussels, this time our own MPs would sit alongside MPs from other countries in a second chamber - a senate. And he wants national governments to play a bigger part in the way Europe is run. So where would this leave the European Parliament and indeed the European Commission? Simon Murphy is the leader of Labour in that parliament and Edward McMillan Scott leads the Conservatives. They both join us from our Birmingham studio. JOHN HUMPHRYS: Mr Murphy, if this happened, if we had this senate it would reduce the authority of the European parliament would it not? SIMON MURPHY: No. The Prime Minister made it very clear that what he is looking at is strengthening the existing institutions with the European Union, that the second chamber may have a role to play there, but you know certainly if we can get national MPs better understanding what we can do jointly to improve the European Union, to deliver on people's priorities, then I think that's got to be an idea worth looking at. HUMPHRYS: But the European parliament is directly elected. I mean Mr Blair talks about this democratic deficit, that's the vogue phrase isn't it. The European parliament is at least directly elected by people who go - who send people like you there to sit there on our behalf. If we had this other system of MPs from national parliaments they would have to be nominated one way or the other, would they not. I mean that would actually be a weakening of democracy wouldn't it? MURPHY: Well, I'm very much an ends-orientated politician. I want to see people better understanding what we do in the European Union. We do a lot of important work particularly in the European parliament that benefits ordinary people and if the second chamber has a role to play then I'm very keen to explore that, and it's something which has been offered as a solution by the Belgian Prime Minister, by the President of the Czech Republic. The Czech Republic hasn't even joined the European Union yet, and indeed the President of Germany, so I think we need to look at it. It's a very important part of a contribution to a debate that is going on. HUMPHRYS: Mr McMillan-Scott, why not. Why not have a second chamber, a senate? EDWARD McMILLAN-SCOTT: Because first of all before the European parliament was elected we used to have a nominated parliament. That was a real talking shop and it really ill behoves Tony Blair who has unwound the upper house in this country now to try and suggest there should be a European senate. And what's interesting about Simon Murphy's replies is the complete lack of enthusiasm on his part for his own leader's proposition. What I think Tony Blair should have done on Friday, and incidentally it depends what version of the speech you read, the one that was issued by the Foreign Office or the one that came from Downing Street, but what he seems to be suggesting is this European senate and greater involvement of national politicians. Do you know at the present time there is a NATO parliamentary assembly, an OSCE parliamentary assembly, a Western European Union parliamentary assembly, not to speak of the one that Paul Flynn was just talking about, the Council of Europe. So we don't need another tier of politicians acting at a European level. What I think Blair should have suggested, and I'm sure Simon Murphy would agree with me is that we should move the European parliament to Brussels and scrap Strasbourg and that all Council of Ministers meetings should be in public. Those are the two suggestions I think he should have made. HUMPHRYS: Well, I think I saw him nodding his head at both of those last ones, but shaking his head rather vigorously when you said there wasn't a great deal of enthusiasm on his part. It didn't sound a desperately enthusiastic endorsement for your leader's speech to be honest, Mr Murphy. MURPHY: Well, I don't want us to get hung up on just one part of the Prime Minister's speech. He did address an awful lot of other issues, in particular this idea that the government should play a more direct role in the governing of the European Union, of the institutions of the European Union, the parliament, the Commission and the Council. I think the Council has the lowest profile, and any raising of its profile will only help people better understand what we're actually doing in the European Union on their behalf. HUMPHRYS: Come to that in a second. To just go back to this second chamber, I mean it would be a recipe would it not for an endless power struggle between senate and senators, or whatever we call them, I don't know because they'd be MPs already - senators and MEPs, it would be a mess wouldn't it? MURPHY: Well my understanding of what the second chamber will do, is it would meet fairly infrequently, it would be only a small body and would have a very limited job to do. It wouldn't get involved in the day to day legislation which again the Prime Minister quite rightly pointed out is the job of the European Parliament. HUMPHRYS: Not exactly dramatic stuff this then, not exactly radical - a little chamber, hardly ever meets. You wonder why you bother really. MURPHY: Well, it's part of this trying to re-connect us with the citizens of the European Union. Clearly when you have only one in four people voting in the European election here in Britain last year, you know it was not restricted to the UK. There were very low turnouts in all member states of the European Union. We have to find ways of actually reaching out to the citizens so they understand what we're doing. The Prime Minister also raised this idea of a charter of competence so that we could clearly understand who does what at European level and what should be at national level and regional level and this may be an area that a second chamber could get involved in. HUMPHRYS: Mr McMillan-Scott, council of ministers doing a bit more, maybe clipping the wings indeed of the Commission. What do you think of that? McMILLAN-SCOTT: I think that the balance of the moment is about right. I don't think we need to make any changes, certainly no more tiers of administration or tiers of politicians. HUMPHRYS: Well that wouldn't be adding a tier on would it, if you gave the Council a bit more... McMILLAN-SCOTT: No, indeed, that's what I'm saying I think we should open up the Council of Ministers. This is the most extraordinary situation. The European Union is the only place in the world where legislation is made in secret by the Council of Ministers making decisions. We never know in detail what goes on there, rather slender minutes are published and we're not supposed to know who voted and which way, although that has been..... HUMPHRYS: What not even you as MEPs are supposed not to know this? McMILLAN-SCOTT: You can now get the information. But as I say it's not a formal part of the treaty, so what you have is a very secretive ministerial meeting which is why incidentally the national parliaments directly should get involved, I believe there should be much wider debates in the House of Commons about European matters both before key decisions are taken and indeed a report back afterwards where the minister has to explain why he voted in a particular way. So there's a lot more transparency that could come in at a national level, but let me just make one other point. There already exists as I've said, a number of organisations at a European level dealing with security matters, dealing with general political issues. There is also a committee of national politicians meeting under the aegis of the European parliament, so it's not as if we're short of mechanisms for making national parliamentarians more involved. I think the problem is that the House of Commons already emasculated by Tony Blair is not particularly interested in debating matters at a European level, I think the European parliament has a long way to go in not only reforming itself but also making itself better understood, but it is not going to be helped by the rather daft idea culled from a rather silly pamphlet that was published last week about a range of propositions for a Europe of the future. A European senate is not what we need. HUMPHRYS: So perhaps Mr Murphy, you should go back to Tony Blair and say: Look, we've all been - perhaps you've already done this, I don't know - we've been looking at what you've said, and yes there are some changes that ought to be made, the Council of Ministers for instance, open it up, make it a bit more powerful or at least give it more to do, but some of these things are really a bit pointless. I mean you've rather damned it if I may say so, with faint praise yourself today. MURPHY: Well I think there is a danger that we get hung up on this one idea that this is the most important speech that's been made by a British Prime Minister in over a generation. It is very much an active contribution to the debate that's going on about how Europe should be organised as we bring in new member states. Just to concentrate on this one issue is, I think, to miss the point and the sort of other issues that the Prime Minister raised of raising the profile of the Council, of having enhanced co-operation where different member states can go off and do different things but within the institutional framework with the extra role for the European Parliament there of actually vetting this idea of enhanced co-operation. You know it was a very wide ranging speech and one that will be looked back on in years to come as a very important contribution from Britain to the debate on the future of Europe. HUMPHRYS: He doesn't want this hard core though does he, at least he doesn't want it at the moment and one wonders whether he doesn't want this hard core pressing ahead because we're not actually in it because we're not in the Euro. MURPHY: No, I think this idea of a hard core is a wrong idea, can you imagine...... HUMPHRYS: It would change if we got in the Euro though wouldn't it? MURPHY: Well the point I was going to make is that why the Prime Minister is in favour of enhanced co-operation within the existing institutional frame work is that it is very much a clear signal I think to the applicant countries who are about to join us. If they felt that the existing countries of the European Union had actually gone ahead and set something up that they could never join then that wouldn't be right. So I very much agree with the Prime Minister - we need a flexible enhanced co-operation but I mean on the Euro, the policy stays the same, we must do what is in Britain's interest, that's something that the Conservative party is refusing to do. HUMPHRYS: Well we've no time to go into all of that but one of the thoughts that he raised was a super power. 'European Union ought to be a super power and not a super state'. Mr McMillan-Scott, do you know what that means. McMILLAN-SCOTT: I know exactly what he means and it's very interesting because here we actually have the Blair agenda revealed. This is the most extraordinary statement. I mean you're quite right, the speech has a lot in it which is, to my mind, a rather shallow speech ill put together as I've said already, badly edited by the Foreign Office and by Downing Street. But, it contains this extraordinary statement that he wants a super power. Admittedly he says he doesn't want a super state but what I think the people of Europe want is to be super people not to be in a super power or super state. So this is really an extraordinary exposure of Tony Blair's real aspiration for the European Union and that to my mind really undermines the whole thing. It was billed as a sort of Bruges type speech. Let's remember that in nineteen eighty-eight, Mrs Thatcher had some extremely important things to say about the future of Europe which in fact in many cases have come true and what I think Tony Blair should have been doing in Warsaw, and incidentally why not make a speech like this in Warsall instead of Warsaw - it would save a lot of people a lot of money, he should have been talking much more about enlargement, if he was going to do so from the capital of one of the applicant countries. You know what's happened in the past few years? In eleven years no single country apart from Eastern Germany has come into the European Union as a result of the collapse of the Berlin Wall - that is a shame and it's a scandal. HUMPHRYS: Okay. Twenty seconds to defend that Mr Murphy. MURPHY: The Prime Minister had to make that statement in Warsaw because..... HUMPHRYS: ..... no the superpower bit. That's the thing that matters - the super power. MURPHY: The super power, the super state - clearly Europe has to play its part on the global stage and if we're going to combat international crime, the sort of drugs racketeering, the sort of racketeering in people that we see we do need that co-operation. So what the Prime Minister was saying I think was a very important contribution to the debate on the future of Europe. HUMPHRYS: Thank you both very much indeed. Simon Murphy and Edward McMillan-Scott And that's it for this week. If you're on the internet a quick reminder about our website which you can see there. Until the same time next week, good afternoon. 22 FoLdEd
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.