 Welcome to another Friday night in with Tiske Sauer. There's still a few months left before we can all head to the pub at the end of a tough week, but we'll be here to keep you company right up until we all get our collective vaccines. Do not worry about that. In fact, we'll be here beyond that as well, if I'm honest with you. We have a jam-packed show for you tonight, including the Supreme Court ruling on Shamima Begum. News on the next round of vaccinations, Labour's tax nightmare, the epic battle between Nicola Sturgeon and Alex Salmond. This is really something to behold. And that viral landlord video, if you haven't seen it already, you will do at the end of this show, and it is definitely worth waiting for. I'll be joined throughout the show by Dalia Gabriel, who I think is under 30. I am. I mean, I'm going to be 28 next month, so I'm creeping to 30, but I'm very much, like, very attached to still being in my 20s, so. Well, what you are is at the back of the queue, I'm afraid. You're getting your vaccine last. This is the first time I've felt, you know, positively, you know, pleased to be over. It's always been something I've just accepted. I didn't. Yeah, I didn't think I was going to get a vaccine at all, so I was like, oh, OK, let alone by July, so I'm OK with that. But my work means that I'm not so worried about things, but for others, it still might seem like very, very far off. We'll be talking about that news from the JCVI have recommended who should get the vaccine next, and they've decided that people's jobs should not be taken into account. We'll have all of that news, that debate coming up a little bit later. First of all, to share the show link, tweet on the hashtag, Tiske Sauer. Put your super chats under the YouTube video and comment on the Twitch stream. Today, the Supreme Court ruled that Shamima Begum, the schoolgirl who ran away to join ISIS, has no right to return to the UK to appeal the stripping of her citizenship. The decision by the Supreme Court overturned a ruling made last year by the Court of Appeal. The Court of Appeal had judged that Begum should have been able to fight the case from the UK. That's the case or the stripping of her citizenship, because she would not be able to do so effectively from a camp in Syria. The Supreme Court found that this decision, the decision by the Court of Appeal, didn't correctly weigh the balance between Begum's right to a fair hearing and Britain's national security. We can go to a Times report. They write, James E.D. Q.C. for the Home Office had claimed there was no guarantee Begum could be monitored by MI5 and it would expose the public to an increased risk of terrorism. He said it would create significant national security risks. That's obviously if she returned. Lord Reed, the president of the Supreme Court, who read out the judgment today, said the Court of Appeal did not give the security assessment the respect it should have received. And we can go to a key quote from that ruling by Lord Reed. So on delivering this verdict, he said, The right to a fair hearing does not trump all other considerations such as the safety of the public. If a vital public interest makes it impossible for a case to be fairly heard, then the courts cannot ordinarily hear it. The appropriate response to the problem in the present case is for the deprivation appeal to be stayed until Miss Begum is in a position to play an effective part in it without the safety of the public being compromised. That is not a perfect solution, as it is not known how long it will be before that is possible. But there is no perfect solution to a dilemma of the present kind. To discuss this ruling, I'm delighted to be joined by Shaiista Aziz, a freelance journalist, a qualities campaigner and Oxford City Councillor. Welcome to the show. Hi, Michael. How are you? I'm very well. How are you doing? I know you've had probably a difficult day talking about this case on the mainstream media. Yeah, it's been an interesting day. Let's put it that way. To start us off, what do you make of make of this ruling by the Supreme Court today? Well, I think a lot of people will be celebrating this Supreme Court ruling, including the tabloid press that have turned Shemima Begum into a caracature, a monster who does not deserve justice. But ultimately, I think today is about a failure of justice. It's been proven that she has not received a fair trial. She cannot access a lawyer. She cannot access justice in the way that she should be able to. So I think this also reflects very badly on this country and how it wants to wash its hands of people who it needs to take responsibility for. Shemima Begum is British. She was born and raised in this country. She left this country at the age of 15. Plenty of evidence shows that she was groomed by ISIS. So this problem of Shemima Begum was created in this country. And I believe Shemima Begum should return to this country to be able to answer the very serious questions that she needs to be able to respond to in relation to what she was doing there, what she involved in the atrocities carried out by ISIS. And the list goes on. So I don't think today is a good day for justice. And so you mentioned they're grooming and I wanted to bring this up because in terms of people who think that Shemima Begum should be brought back to Britain and shouldn't have her citizenship strip. There's sort of two different strands, I think. So one group says she was actually groomed. You know, she was 15 when she she went over to join ISIS and she, you know, we can't assume she had agency to make that decision. She was a vulnerable person who was exploited potentially. And then the other group says, look, no sympathy for her being groomed is no or, you know, being groomed or not groomed. There's no excuse for going to join ISIS. But the reason she should come back is because she's Britain's problem. It's Britain's responsibility. So that's why she should come back to be appropriately punished. Do you see those in any ways in conflict? Which which which one of those groups do you find yourself in? So I think you can believe both those things at the same time. I think it's perfectly possible to look at the evidence and believe that Shemima Begum, along with her two school friends were groomed by a terrorist entity online in London. There is plenty of evidence out there that they were failed by the system, the safeguarding system, other systems that should have picked up what was going on. It didn't pick up what was going on. These were very vulnerable young girls. They somehow managed to leave this country, board a flight, head over to Syria, which is in the middle of a war and join a terrorist entity. So it's perfectly possible to look at the evidence and conclude that that is factually true and to also believe that she should be returning back to the UK because she is British. Despite the fact that citizenship has been stripped by the Home Secretary, the fact of the matter is she was born in this country, she was raised in this country. She's never lived in any other country. I know there's attempts by the British government to suggest she should go to Bangladesh, which is the country of her parents origin. She's never set foot in Bangladesh. Shemima Begum is a product of this country and she should come back to the country to face justice and to answer very serious questions about what she was doing there. What, you know, potentially, does she carry out any atrocities for ISIS itself? These questions need to be answered. And so in terms of defences of this decision, what I've heard from watching the news today, the people who say it was the right decision to not let her come back. Is they say that, yes, it would be great if we could bring Brack Shemima Begum and have a fair trial and look at all the evidence that's been collected and judge how long she should go to jail for. The counter they give is that actually it's really difficult to collect evidence from a war zone. So if she were to come back to Britain, it would be very difficult to try her and to find her guilty by a standard that would be accepted by a British court. And so therefore you would have a safety problem, which I mean, I don't know how credible you find this. But the Home Office have said it would be too difficult to monitor her 24 hours a day. I mean, what do you think should happen to her if she comes back? And how would you respond to those those concerns? So I think one of the issues is the way that this case has been politicised by the Home Office, by the Home Secretary, Sajid Javid and now Priti Patel. This case has become a political football. It never should have got to this. The fact of the matter is she is a British citizen. A citizenship has been revoked. I do understand that it's been stripped without any proper due process, without any transparency. And today we know that the Supreme Court has said that there is a window for her if she is able to make contact with her legal team and instruct them to carry out an appeal, then that's possible. We also know that it wasn't safe for her to speak to a legal team. So this is not justice. This is not justice served in any shape, by or form. I also think we need to look at the way in which Shamima Begum's case has been framed by a lot of the media in this country. She's been turned into this monster, you know, at no point as anybody should try to look at her. As a victim of grooming, that does not mean that we then absolve her of taking any responsibility for what she has or hasn't done in Syria. But we need to be able to look at the full picture and we need to be able to do it in the correct way. I also believe that her identity, the fact that she is other, the fact that she's British Muslim and she looks so different to what some people view as a victim of grooming and sexual exploitation is part of the issue. She races at the heart of this as is Islamophobia. As I said, that does not detract from the fact that she should answer the questions that should be put to her in a court of law to find out what she was doing there. And, you know, Britain is not an exception here across Europe. European citizens have been leaving to join the Islamic State. Other countries in Europe, namely France, found ways to bring their citizens back and to find out what they've been up to. So this is not out of the realms of possibility for this country either. And of course, we've brought lots of people back who didn't have a parent from a different country. So the only the only reason she is not able to be brought back or the only reason I suppose they can justify not bringing her back is because she has a parent who was not born in Britain. And so in principle could have a right to Bangladeshi citizenship, even though they're never going to give it to her, right? Exactly. Exactly. So it's a convenient way of offloading a problem. But the thing is the problem is not going to go away. I want to talk to you about how you found speaking about this. So you're a Labour councillor. Obviously, this is a very controversial decision which has been made by the Supreme Court. You might expect the opposition party to be putting up sort of front benches to talk about it in the news. There's very much silence from Keir Starmer's front bench. You can see why they don't want to speak about this. It's a very, I mean, Shamiba Begum is a very unpopular person to be defending or even for her right to be defending her rights. Obviously, not her actions. How have you found it as a Labour councillor, especially as a Muslim woman, Labour councillor, saying that actually the treatment of this woman is not right? You know, do you feel like you've put yourself in a vulnerable position by making these arguments? So I've written about Shamiba Begum's case and I do a lot of anti-racism work, especially with young women, young Muslim women looking at the issues of Islamophobia. And I can tell you that some of the things I've heard over the last few years have really shook me to my core. So, for example, I was asked to go into a school in London to talk to a group of young girls under the age of 15, so similar age to Shamiba Begum when she left this country, all the daughters of immigrants, all young girls of colour. And I said to them, when was the last time you saw someone who looked like you being represented on mainstream television or in a magazine or, you know, any time you looked online in the last few years? And the response to this, Michael, was Shamiba Begum and my heart fell. And, you know, I was shocked to hear that this is what these young girls believe, you know, it's the first time, you know, the only time that they've seen someone who looks like them is someone who, you know, epitomises, you know, Shamiba Begum. And then within a heartbeat, another girl said, yeah, but miss, they also say she's a terrorist. So for a lot of young British Muslims, particularly invisible Muslim women who wear the hijab, the issue of Shamiba Begum is one of personal safety. You know, when the issue, when the issue of Shamiba Begum is discussed in really charged, racist, to some a phobic ways, it has an impact on the safety of young British women, young Muslim women. It absolutely does for a lot of people. They don't want to understand that or accept that, but it's a fact. And how could that be, I suppose, countered? I mean, obviously we've got a media class who are, you know, have no problem with the fact that they're reporting, sort of, animates racism, essentially. But do you think that, for example, the party you're in, do you think it has more responsibility to speak loudly about this or, you know, being fair to Keir Starmer and their leadership team? Do you understand why they're sitting out this one? Well, I think the issue of Shamiba Begum has become overly politicised by politicians. And really, I think that the heat needs to be taken out of this discussion about her. And this is no longer about Shamiba Begum. This is much bigger than one woman and one issue in terms of her personal case. This is much bigger than this. This is about the government being able to do what it once can't launch without any transparency. The issue of citizenship being stripped from British people has been going on for many, many years. Shamiba Begum isn't the only individual that's been out in Syria who's faced this. There's others that we know of whose citizenship has been stripped in secret. So I do think it's the job of the opposition to hold the government to account. Absolutely. And of course, I think, you know, Labour is the party of equality, so it should not be sitting on the fence on this issue. So, yeah, I do think that, you know, there should be a response from the Labour Party. But as I said, one of the biggest problems that we have is that this case has become a political football and Shamiba Begum has become a bogey woman. And she still deserves justice as everyone does. Shaiyista Aziz, thank you so much for joining us this evening and your insights on this very difficult topic. And I have to say, you know, my solidarity for speaking up on an issue that I imagine is quite a thankless task going out on the airwaves and speaking about this one. So thank you so much. Thanks, Michael. If you haven't already, do share the show stream. The Joint Commission on Vaccination and Immunisation today released their recommendations for phase two of the COVID vaccine rollout. And they have decided to continue to distribute the vaccine on the basis of age. And this is a graphic from Public Health England. It is remarkably simple. So those aged 40 to 49 will get vaccinated next, then 30 to 39, then 18 to 29. This is obviously, of course, after phase one is completed, which means everyone who is over 50 and everyone who has a serious comorbidity is a serious condition that makes COVID more dangerous. Explaining the decision a press release from Public Health England explained. The committee agreed that max vaccination targeting occupational groups would be more complex to deliver and may slow down the vaccine program, leaving some more vulnerable people at higher risk unvaccinated for longer. Operationally simple and easy to deliver programs are critical for rapid deployment and high vaccine uptakes. They're saying, basically, this is the quickest way to do it. We want to keep it simple. The vaccine rollout has been going pretty fast. Let's keep it that way. And the way you do that is by just doing it by age, not taking into account other complex considerations. So when does this mean everyone can expect to get vaccinated? This is a graphic from the BBC summarizing it. So January to April, by the end of April, the government have said that everyone who is in phase one, so that's the over 50s care home residents, health care workers and people and those required to shield. People required to shield. Sorry. I think it's slightly broader than people who are required to shield, actually, in that phase one. Then in phase two, so this is by July the 31st for their first dose, though I'm hoping it will be slightly sooner. It's going from, as I've said already, the people in their 40s, people in their 30s and then people in their 20s and the over 18s. Now, as I've said, the benefit of this plan is the simplicity, but the decision has disappointed a number of groups who have been lobbying to be prioritised in phase two of the vaccine rollout. This is from the BBC report. They write, Jeff Barton, who is General Secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, the ASCL, said he was disappointed that education staff would not be prioritised in the next phase. So he says this is important not only in reassuring staff who it expects to work in busy and crowded environments, but also in terms of minimising disruption to education caused by staff absence as a result of COVID. Metropolitan Police Federation Chairman Ken Marsh criticised the plans to prioritise by age groups saying it's absolutely disgusting. They don't give a damn about us. So you can see there are two groups of people who are being told it's mandatory for them to go out and put themselves in situations where it's quite likely to catch the virus. So teachers and police officers both coming into contact with a lot of people, very difficult to socially distance. I mean, basically impossible to socially distance if you're in those jobs. And so they have a very strong argument to say, if we're going to be put in that position, then we should be vaccinated first. So who is right? And again, on this, I think it is difficult to say. I think both sides have really strong arguments here. So for speed, which I do think matters, age is the best. So one of the reasons why the British rollout of the vaccine has been going quite so fast is one because we have the National Health Service. So everyone's details are sort of logged and they can just test text people out on a mass basis to ask them to come in. Whereas, say, for example, in America, much more difficult because everyone has different private insurers, etc. The other reason is because we're doing it by age. So your doctor's surgery has everyone's date of birth. And what that means is they just send out a mass text when it's coming the time for people in their sixties to get done, people in their fifties to get done. Very, very quick. I've seen it happen with with my parents as an impressive system. But there is a strong argument for fairness that if you are being put in harm's way, you should be protected, have corresponding protection. There's also the issue of how do we stop new variants emerging? Again, here, theoretically, you should vaccinate the people who are making the most contacts because that's going to do the most to reduce transmission at the same time. That could be, I suppose, undermined if this really slows down the process. So complex issue. But we've been given our answer by the JCVI and it's very unlikely. I think that the government are going to do anything other than adopt that whole sale. Dalia, Gabriel, I want to bring you in. What is your take on this with the JCVI correct to say, let's keep it simple. Let's do it by age. Or should they have taken more seriously the concerns of people like teachers and the police? I think it's it's a really, really difficult one. And I really do understand both sides of this, to be honest. On the one hand, rapid vaccination is really good, especially now that we know that the vaccines lower transmission and because having and having the population vaccinated before winter, I think, is very important will make a massive difference. We don't want to go through another winter like the one we've just gone through. And, you know, it makes sense to to make use of the summer when transmission is generally low anyway to get everyone vaccinated by the government's current plan by the 31st of July. Everyone over 18 should be should be vaccinated. And there's also something, I think, about the clarity of doing it by age. And as we've learned, clarity is very important in public health messaging. And so, you know, that also means that the strategy appears sensible. But on the other hand, I think that this government has been very neglectful generally of the question of work in this in this pandemic and how the work that you do completely shaped how you are experiencing this pandemic, especially with the threat of long COVID, which, you know, we still don't understand. So, you know, we can't anticipate who is at risk of long COVID. And I think the effects of long COVID are often really minimized, you know, from personal knowledge of people who are close to me. It can have extremely devastating long term physical and mental health effects. And of course, you know, the suffering and the death of the lead, the late Ed Rootsby is testament to that. And for self-employed people as well, for whom, you know, even though if you get long COVID, you can access furlough for self-employed people. That process of accessing long COVID furlough is really difficult. And obviously, if you are self-employed, you know, being out of, you know, being knocked out for six months, which is something that several people that I personally know who would be in that kind of 20s and 30s age bracket, but who work in very high risk jobs can have devastating effects if you are self-employed. And, you know, there's a giant gap in that data really around long COVID. You know, many long COVID cases are recorded as recovered. So we really don't really know and I think take into consideration the impacts of that and, you know, that it's not just a binary of either you're hospitalized or you're completely fine. So in that context, vaccinating groups that are at high risk of transmission seems seems very urgent. And I guess I wonder why there can't be some kind of combined approach, because that's kind of what we've had so far. You know, we've had over 70s and 80s, but also at the same time as that, people who are in certain professions, like in health care professions, social care, those things have been able to happen alongside each other. And we do have the data on which jobs are most at risk and which jobs have the highest transmission rates. You know, teachers, hospitality workers, taxi drivers. So I don't understand why we can't use that data to say, you know, OK, the sort of top 10 most at risk professions can can also be vaccinated sooner with a kind of combined staggered approach, which has already proved successful that that can be done in a timely manner where we generally go by age. That's the general rule. But some exceptions are made for high risk professions. But the thing that I want to point out here, because I was thinking about this as you were talking, is the left should really be using this moment to make the case that, you know, the vaccination program is probably the only successful thing that this government has done in this entire in this entire pandemic. And the reason that is is because it was an outsource to some, you know, corner cutting private company. It was an outsource to like a mate of a cabinet member. It was done by the NHS. It was using the NHS is already existing infrastructure. And it was using public sector workers, you know, and that's why we've seen this like high efficiency and effectiveness is because it's because the priority of the program is not to try and make profits like it was done for, you know, the school meals, the ASCO, the track and trace, the PPE supplies earlier on. The priority was simply to vaccinate as many people as possible, as quickly as possible. And when that's your only priority, unsurprisingly, you actually managed to pull it off. And so I think next time we hear that, you know, the public sector is is ineffective or it can't handle big projects or it's inefficient and that, you know, privatization equals efficiency and cost effectiveness. We have to really remind people which sector actually got stuff done when shit hit the fan. Absolutely. And this is all organised locally by GPs, essentially. So is the GP sends out the text and invites people to get to get vaccinated? And this is what people like independent said have been saying the whole time, which is that it should be GPs and local public health bodies that should be in charge of test and trace. Maybe if that had happened much earlier on, we wouldn't have had quite the disastrous winter that we just experienced, that we just witnessed and that we just suffered. Let's go to some unambiguously good news. So we said that this story about the order of who gets vaccinated when complex issue. There'll be lots of people very understandably, rightly disappointed by it. The next thing I've got to show you, everyone can admit is just great. This is unambiguous good news. Let's get it up. It's the percentage of people age 70 and over who have received their first vaccine doses to the 21st of February. And you can see here the numbers are phenomenal. So in the Southwest, 99 percent of people who are over the age of 70 have gone to get their vaccine in the North, Eastern Yorkshire. It's 97 percent in the Midlands, East of England, Southeast. It's also 97 percent. So you can see this is, you know, the uptake here is higher than anyone could have imagined. And this is actually making me quite, you know, positive about the possibilities that we're going to be able to unlock on time and potentially even what I don't think we'll unlock earlier than than they say. But I think this this could get under control fairly soon, because these are rates of vaccinations that, you know, the modelers weren't predicting. So their modelers, their models were often based on about 90 percent of people getting the vaccine, 80 percent. We're seeing, you know, phenomenal figures here. We'll have to, you know, be on guard to make sure that younger people are also as keen to take the vaccines as older people are, but it's good news. More unambiguous, good news for you is that whilst uptake of vaccines is incredibly high, we also have evidence that vaccines don't just stop you getting disease, they stop you transmitting disease. So this came out today. A study of healthcare workers at Adam Brooks Hospital in Cambridge, which suggests a single dose of the Pfizer vaccine cuts the risk of COVID transmission by 75 percent. Previous studies have shown the AstraZeneca vaccine also reduces transmission, even if by a slightly lower amount. So they think between 50 and 67 percent, although whenever we get scientists on, they tell us that it's very difficult to compare studies because they're all using different methods and different means of accounting efficacy. So I'll give you all of those caveats. But basically what we know, lots of people are taking the vaccine. Stop a lot of transmission, which means that I mean, they are essentially going to be a route out of this. So long as we can stop transmission going so out of control that we end up with vaccine escape, which would be disastrous, but lots of reasons to feel very positive, even if not to have a gung-ho loosening of the situation. We currently find ourselves in. We're going to end the COVID section on good news. Wonderful. Thank you to Super Chat donations from Mary Dwyer, from Sardia Chowdhury and Red Rock 1965. We do appreciate them and lots more, apparently. So thank you for those. And of course, if you are a regular donor to Navarra Media, thank you so much. You make this possible. That is how Navarra Media rolls on. So we do appreciate your donations, however you make them. Let's go straight on to our next story. We're running on time today. Rishi Sunak's plan to raise corporation tax in next week's budget has prompted Labour to go into a mini meltdown. Now, first in a bid to appear pro business at Prime Minister's questions. This week, Keir Starmer demanded Boris Johnson rule out any tax rise. But couldn't the Prime Minister at least agree with me today that now is not the time for tax rises for families and for businesses? So it had been briefed that the Tory party were going to put up corporation tax at next week's budget. Starmer said, no, do not put up taxes on corporations. However, what's happened since then is it's become apparent that actually the public would quite like to put up taxes on corporations. The Labour Party are on the wrong side of public opinion. And Annalise Dodds, who's the shadow Chancellor, has been speaking in slightly more reserved terms as to what Labour's position is on higher corporation tax. So she told an audience at UCL on Thursday, there's clearly a discussion to be had around corporation tax. Obviously, the UK's corporation tax is lower than that of many comparable nations. And I've always been clear that I think it's really important. We do have a more progressive tax system. But there's a big question about whether we need to see immediate changes to the tax system coming in and applying to businesses and families right now. So there she's saying there's just a question about whether they need to come in right now. That's quite different to saying, can you rule out now? I'm raising taxes on businesses. Now the shadow Chancellor, the person who is responsible for economic policy says, there's a question about whether that's a good idea. Lisa Nandi, who is the shadow foreign secretary, was slightly more, I suppose, enthusiastic about the opposition to oppose raising corporation tax. She explained Labour's position on Thursday's politics life. We need far more certainty and we need a clear approach from this government in line with other major countries in the world that says we're not going to choke off the recovery before it started. There will be a time for raising taxes, doing it fairly and paying down the debt. But that time is not now. It would be madness to choke off the recovery in towns like mine before it's even begun. Right. But what about other kinds of taxes? What about capital gains tax, for example, taxes on unearned wealth? I mean, Lisa, you sat in this studio, I think, just over a year ago and said that that was something you wanted to look at, a wealth tax. We've absolutely got to look at the fairest way of paying for this. There are people who've done well out of the pandemic. You know, those people who happen to have the health secretary's mobile number, for example, seem to have done particularly well out of the pandemic. But most businesses who pay corporation tax are not in that position. And the idea that you would be suggesting doing this. A windfall. What about a windfall tax, then, on some of those that have done very well, as you said? Party is just is not a responsible course of action. I think he's absolutely right to look at how you pay for this. But the best way that you can pay down the debt is to make sure that you don't rack up more debt right now. And if you have mass unemployment, if you have businesses going to the wall, then that is exactly what you're going to see. And as we saw in the 1980s, when we saw this approach, you pay for that for decades and decades to come. So Lisa and Andy, they're explaining the economic argument. So she says there will be a time for raising taxes, but that taxes, but that time is not now. And she says it would be madness to choke off the recovery. She also says the way to pay down debts is not to accrue loads more debts. It's slightly confusing. To me, I think this is bad politics. We explained on Wednesday why on Wednesday's Tiskey Sour. But is it good economics? So I have gotten an economist on to discuss this. You don't have to just rely on my picking up facts from the internet. Now we've got a proper economist and it is Laurie McFarlane, economics editor at Open Democracy and fellow at UCL's Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose. Thank you so much for joining us this evening. Thanks for having me. Laurie, is this good economics? She's saying raising taxes in principle a good thing, but now is not the time to do it because we're in a, I don't know if we are in a recession, but anyway, we're in a difficult economic situation. For me, I think Labour's position is a bit of a mess. I think it fails on all fronts. You pointed out, I think it's bad politics. I think it hands the Tories a gift electorally. But crucially, I think it's bad economics. And concerningly, it seems to be a massive step backwards, I think, from the limited progress that's been made over the course of the past five years or so. So the justification is that, although they support more progressive taxation generally, now is not the time because of this idea that it will choke off the recovery, as we heard Lisa Nandi say there. Now, for me, it's absolutely right. We don't want to choke off the recovery. But what matters in terms of how it will impact the recovery, it's not so much the individual taxes that are how they change, but what happens overall at the budget? So what's the net impact of all the changes put together? Is that going to be help the recovery or not? And so if I was Labour, I would be suggesting putting forward a significant economic stimulus like we're seeing in the US with Joe Biden, quite ambitious to help put money in people's pockets, help the recovery, etc. And then as part of that overall package, having the conversation to say it's only right that as part of this budget we're taking steps to start to remedy some of the injustices that's been imposed on people through the COVID pandemic. And that means part of that means ensuring that those who have benefited from the pandemic pay their fair share. And obviously, when it comes to corporation tax, it's a tax on profits. It's only those who are making profits who would pay it. So those businesses that are really struggling and aren't making profits, wouldn't pay it. And obviously, the windfall tax is even stronger there because it's those who have only benefited significantly. And for me, I think the thing that's most concerning about Labour's position is that it really ignores the one main thing that for me is the biggest threat to the recovery, which is that the risk that we simply sort of stand by and let the situation unfold where we have some significant winners from the pandemic basically continue to hoover up wealth and power from the majority who are still quite suffering. And that will mean we see this kind of slow and unbalanced recovery. We see inequalities get worse and we have sort of big multinationals gobble up more market share and the expense, perhaps, of of local firms. We see households who've maybe saved quite a lot in the pandemic because they earn a lot of money and they haven't been spending much. Start to plough more money into the housing market, kicking the ladder away from everyone else, etc. And so for me, I'd like to see Labour say, yeah, we don't want to choke off the recovery, we want to kickstart a recovery. But we want to make sure that as part of that, we want to make sure that we're starting to rectify some of these injustices. And I think that that's just completely missing from Labour's offer at the moment. So I want to put to you the argument which is being pushed by people close to the leader's office. So it seems like people who work for Keir Starmer, I imagine. This is from a write up by Paul War of the controversy. And he is told by one senior party source and that the approach being advocated by Ian Lavery and Richard Bergen is an unintended argument for austerity because it suggests you can fiddle with taxes and spending to pay off debt accumulated in an economic downturn. It's the mirror of the argument George Osborne made a decade ago. Labour must be far more ambitious. We should be the party focused on working with business to grow the economy and tackle the long term weaknesses of our unequal and insecure economy, which is the way Britain will balance the books. So Laurie, is the argument you've been making now, which is similar to the argument that Ian Lavery and Richard Bergen are making, are you just mirroring the argument that George Osborne made a decade ago? Well, it's funny that because what is mirroring George Osborne's argument is what Lisa and Andy said in that clip that we just showed about saying the way to pay down the debt is not to rack up more debt just now. I mean, that's literally the kind of thing that George Osborne was saying for a long time that's been thoroughly discredited now. I mean, even the IMF completely disagrees with that now. The OECD, others. And so the idea that raising corporation taxes supporting austerity, I think, is is just not true. As I said before, what matters is the overall package of of the budget. And so, yes, if if you're increasing corporation tax in a budget that was also cutting public expenditure, that was also yet that was a that was a retractionary budget, then, yes, it would be. But if it's part of an overall budget, which is clearly a stimulus, which is clearly about putting money in people's pockets, having, you know, increasing corporation tax a little bit. Bear in mind the UK, we're talking about increasing it. We have the lowest corporation tax in G7. We're still going to be one of the lowest. It's not, you know, increasing it dramatically. The idea that this is promoting austerity, I think, is is really desperate stuff. And I think that they're really digging themselves a significant hole here and at a time where, you know, the Tories have really moved on. You know, the Tories are not George Osborne, David Cameron anymore. The left spent part of the better part of the past decade fighting this austerity narrative of fighting this idea that the government budgets like a household, you know, now the Tories have moved on from that. And now Labour have, you know, reverted back to that. And I think it's a really dangerous place that they put themselves in because, you know, this stuff isn't popular. Let's go back to the politics of this and whether or not this is popular because there has been in the last couple of days as well, lots of polls coming out that suggesting that this is politically really disastrous, the position that they've found themselves in. So former Downing Street pollster James Johnson shared some results yesterday. So on Thursday of a poll conducted by his consultancy, which showed an increase in corporation tax is popular across all voting groups. Sixty seven percent of the public support a raise in corporation tax. Now, that's among conservative voters. Sixty five percent. So sixty five percent of conservative voters back this policy to increase corporation tax that goes up to seventy six percent among Labour voters. You can see that the amount of people actively opposing this is minuscule. Thirteen percent of conservative voters oppose it and only six percent of Labour voters oppose it. So this is raising corporation tax a really, really popular policy. James Johnson, who used to be a pollster for Theresa May, also wrote a comment piece based on focus groups and which he had been doing. And in that piece, he writes, with changes to taxation were framed as part of people's contribution to a national effort as we rebuild from the pandemic or as an act of paying back to our NHS. There is the potential for a powerful new narrative tapping into this new public consensus, a desire to tackle the debt, but through fair tax rises rather than reduced spending. And he goes on to be completely damning of Labour's strategy on corporation tax. So he says, if Labour does go ahead and set itself up in opposition to this measure next week, it risks letting the Conservatives walk away with the spoils, able to further project themselves as the party of the workers. Stammer's calculation on tax seems based on a dated perception of the voters. Labour needs to win more Tony Blair's southern Mondeo man than the working class traditionally Labour voter in the North and Midlands. Imagine if Stammer stood up last week and said he wanted to see a general tax rise with a higher rate for higher earners to fund a pay boost for our beleaguered NHS staff challenging the Conservatives to do the same. You do not need to be well versed in public opinion to know that would have created a bigger impression than a policy about bond markets. Now, as I say, he was a pollster for Theresa May. An ally of Stammer could say that's not necessarily someone with the best pedigree when it comes to what are the correct positions to take to win the election. But you can't really argue with the numbers in that poll. And what I want to ask you, Laurie, is because what he is talking about there, James Johnson, is the idea that even in the long run, the Tories are positioning themselves to have a more popular, progressive economic policy than Labour. And I want to know from you the extent to which you think that could be a reality. You know, this is just one policy. It also balances out with Labour saying we wouldn't cut universal credit, for example. But do you think that there is a real danger over the next two years that when you look at their whole economic package, the Tories end up to the left of the Labour Party? I think there's definitely a risk of that. And I think certainly if this week is anything to go by, I think that that's a real material risk. And I think the bizarre thing here really overall is that this is an area where, in theory, this is an area where Labour again could have argued that they were ahead of the game here. You know, they were making the case for increases to corporation tax for quite some time and indeed on high earners. And so this could have been a case where Labour said, well, glad you finally agree with us. And actually, here's where you need to go further. And instead, they've sort of tried to position themselves, you know, far at the other end, as I say, at a time where the sort of consensus, mainstream consensus on some of this stuff globally has shifted dramatically from where it was 10 years ago. And so I do think that at the moment, it seems like Labour don't have a vision, a clear vision, to offer the electorate on any of this stuff. And the Tories, you know, flawed, although it might be, you know, talking about things like levelling up, talking about throwing not insignificant sums of money around the country, talking up a big green agenda, at least rhetorically, they've got COP26. Rishi Sunak's lining up, you know, a whole package of goodies when the economy reopens again, obviously off the back of what seems to be a vaccination programme that's, you know, doing not bad. I think, all in all, I would be very worried, you know, if I think of people who aren't very politically engaged and don't follow this all the time, you know, who's going to look more attractive, you know, the Tories who are, you know, seem to have actually quite a lot of stuff on offer and a bit of a narrative or Labour who just seem to be stuck and don't seem to have anything. And so unless they really do start to change direction and really start to carve out a real vision and a real narrative about what they're about, where they want to go, a progressive vision, then I do think there's a real issue, a real risk that the Tories will basically outflank them. And as I said, part the tanks firmly on Labour's lawn here. Such a bizarre position for us to find ourselves in. Laurie, I'm going to keep you there because I want you to put on your Scottish politics hat in a moment when we talk about Alex Salmond and Nicola Sturgeon. Darly, I want to bring you in on this question while we're still talking about Labour, because there's a real political bind that I think Keir Starmer is in now, because it seems to me from sort of what I'm reading, and from, you know, how uncomfortable Annalise Dodds is sounding about this, that they're tempted to do a U-turn and say, oh, no, actually, we were only against corporation taxes if they come in literally, you know, next week. In fact, if Rishi Sunak says they'll come in in six months time, we're fine with that, we'll back them. And that would be, you know, a position which is more popular with the public. The problem for them is Keir Starmer stood up and demanded Boris Johnson not raise taxes. And it's actually the one of the most damaging lines that Boris Johnson has against Keir Starmer is to say you flip flop all the time, you're constantly changing positions. So Labour is really boxed in now, right? I mean, what do you think they're going to choose? Stick with a really unpopular policy or flip flop again? I mean, I think he'll try and slither his way out of it and say that it was always his idea, you know, to do this. This is always part of his grand three phase strategy. I think the public can see through that. And you know, I mean, where was this energy and this clarity from Keir Starmer when teachers were being forced to, you know, go back to school and teach when we were at the highest rate of transmission. But when it comes to a policy that will, you know, entrench inequalities that have already been intensified by the pandemic, that he's as clear as day, although obviously, you know, we've seen sort of confusion and flip flopping in the aftermath. And you know, this kind of stuff is just a clear signal to people, not only that Labour has no vision and has no overriding narrative, but also that it's just not the party of the working class. And it begs the question, who is Labour the party for? And, you know, for me, like just the economic illiteracy of it and the fact that, you know, as movement, you know, as a bunch of movements that have gathered together under that labour of anti, that label of anti-austerity has spent the past, you know, five to 10 years trying to bust this economic myth that, you know, about balancing the book that, you know, the national economy is run like a household economy or a household budget. We've succeeded in that. We won the fight. And Stammer's Labour literally tries to directly undo that, try to directly undermine the success of movements around anti-austerity. Because when I was reading all of this, I was thinking, I must be misunderstanding that. Surely he's not doing the household budget thing. But it turns out that, you know, it literally was just that incoherent. And it reminded me of another recent intervention that Stammer made on drug decriminalisation, which is another policy that, you know, progressives are winning on. It's increasingly becoming clear that, you know, where the wind is going, that people are kind of understanding that criminalising drugs does not do much other than criminalised communities. And Stammer finds it within himself to talk about how he doesn't support decriminalising drugs because of the criminality and the violence that's associated with the drug trade, which everyone knows is reduced if you decriminalise drugs. So it's again this habit of trying to outflank the Conservative Party on, you know, social and economic issues. And being politically and also like logically illiterate. It's a very, very worrying indication of the state of the opposition. And the public are going to pick up on it. They are picking up on it. We've got some good comments that agree with you, Dahlia. Julie Battinson with a, or Battison with a tenor, mixed messages again from Labour corporation taxes are low. The big corporations will survive. I wholeheartedly agree. And one of the big problems of this is Labour are now giving the impression that actually high corporation tax is really bad for growth, which is a terrible message for a Labour Party to be putting forward. Tom Kornford tweets on the hashtag Tisgy Sour, excellent on Labour's corporation tax debacle. Basically the leadership seems intent on positioning the party on the losing side of an argument they spent half of the last decade winning. That is very well summarised in 280 characters. That is precisely what the Labour Party are very disappointingly doing in this situation. What can you say? It was also, it's worth mentioning, it's in his ten pledges. Actually pledge one, Keir Starmer's first pledge in his ten pledges was to support a rise on corporation tax. So how we found ourselves here within a year is difficult to understand. Or maybe it's not, maybe, you know, if you're cynical about Starmer you would have expected this all along. Let's go to our next story. Now, today the extraordinary round between Nicola Sturgeon and her predecessor as SNP leader in Scotland's First Minister took a dramatic new turn as Alex Salmond spoke for four hours in front of the Hollywood committee accusing the current SNP government of concealing evidence lying and conspiracy to put him in jail. In his opening statement he gave this damning assessment of Sturgeon's leadership. Some people say that the failures of these institutions, the blurring of the boundaries between party, government and prosecution service, mean that Scotland is in danger of becoming a failed state. I disagree. The Scottish Civil Servant hasn't failed. Its leadership has failed. The Crown Office hasn't failed. Its leadership has failed. Scotland hasn't failed. Its leadership has failed. So the importance of this inquiry is for each and every one of us to help put this right. Now for those of us who only periodically dip into Scottish politics it might be pretty confusing what's going on here. Salmond and Sturgeon allies won the protégé of the other and Scotland's two most high-profile advocates for independence. But this row has been brewing since 2018. That was the year that two civil servants alleged in a complaint to the Scottish government that they had been sexually harassed by Salmond when he had been first minister. Now in response to that complaint the Scottish government launched an investigation into the allegations. However that inquiry was found, or that investigation sorry, was later found to have been unlawful after it became apparent the official put in charge of the investigation had previously met and counseled the two complainants. So you had complaints against Salmond and an investigation into those complaints and then a court finds that that investigation was itself unlawful because of who was put in charge of it. Now the Scottish government admitted in court its handling of the complaint had been tainted by apparent bias. That of course though did not have for mean anything about the complaints himself and it was in last March that Salmond was tried in court on 13 charges of sexual harassment against nine women. And then again after a two week trial a jury cleared him on all counts. Now on 12 of those charges Salmond was found not guilty while on one a verdict of not proven was delivered. So since that verdict scrutiny has shifted from Alex Salmond to his successor to Nicola Sturgeon with two inquiries being set up about the whole Ferrari, about the whole series of events. The first of those which is the one that Salmond spoke to today you just saw a clip of it that concerns the government's handling of the initial sexual harassment complaint who they put in charge of it and and all the all the different controversies that surrounded that. The second is being led by a QC so not happening in Hollywood and concerns whether Sturgeon misled parliament. I hope you're still following this. I told you it was complicated. Now in his written submission to the Hollywood committee today this is about the government's handling of the sexual harassment complaint. Salmond said the following the inescapable conclusion is of a malicious and concerted attempt to damage my reputation and remove me from public life in Scotland. It is an attempt which would in fact have succeeded but for the protection of the court and jury system and in particular the court of session and the high court of just judiciary. However underlying all of this and perhaps the most serious issue of all is the complete breakdown of the necessary barriers which should exist between government political party and indeed the prosecution authorities in any country which abides by the rule of law. He also claimed in this was the written submission that a deliberate prolonged malicious and concerted effort amongst a range of individuals within the Scottish government and SMP to damage my reputation even to the extent of having me imprisoned. Now these are all really really serious claims for someone to be making about their their successor who was their chosen successor. Let's take a look at what else happened in that committee today. So it was four hours long these are some highlights. It was the government who were found to have been acted unlawfully unfairly and tainted by apparent bias. I know that the First Minister asserts that I have to prove a case. I don't. That has already been done. There have been two court cases, two judges, one jury. In this inquiry it's the Scottish Government, a Government which has already admitted to behaving unlawfully who are under examination. I have watched with growing frustration over the last six months where this committee has been systematically deprived of the evidence it has legitimately sought. Indeed I'm just about your only witness who has been actively trying to present you with evidence as opposed to withholding it. I watched an astonishment on Wednesday when the First Minister of Scotland, the First Minister of Scotland, used a Covid press conference, a Covid press conference, to effectively question the result of a jury. Still I said nothing. Well today that changes. This committee has been blocked and tackled at every turn with calculated and deliberate suppression of key evidence. Even Parliament, our Scottish Parliament, has been defied despite two votes demanding the external legal advice that the public have paid for. My evidence has been published then subsequently censured by intervention of the Crown Office. Evidence that they had previously agreed was lawful and even today I appear before you under the explicit threat of prosecution if I reveal evidence for which the committee has asked. Not to fulfil my oath and tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth would be a contempt but Crown Office says it might lead to prosecution. People should just stop and think for a moment about that. So that last point he's making is referring to the fact the written submission which he originally presented to the committee on Monday had to be withdrawn on request of the Crown Office. That was on the basis and they say that it risk revealing the identity of the complainants in the sexual harassment case. Salmond is arguing that if that is if his full submission is not revealed then he is not able to tell the full truth about what happened. Opposition parties have joined Salmond in suggesting that this all stank of cover up the fact that his whole written submission could not be heard and he could not refer to it. Yesterday in the Scottish Parliament Nicola Sturgeon denied there was any such conspiracy. The scrutiny of me is as I said earlier it's important, it's necessary, it's entirely legitimate. What is not legitimate is to pursue a conspiracy theory, a Scorched Earth policy that threatens the reputation and the integrity of Scotland's independent justice institutions just because you happen to dislike this government and to sacrifice all of that if I may say so, Presiding Officer, on the altar of the ego of one man. So I told you this was dramatic and very complicated and I am delighted that I'm still joined by Laurie McFarlane to talk about it all. So I first want to ask about the political context here because I mean without us going into all of the complexities of the legality of who said what and why, what really struck out to me is that Salmon is claiming there is a conspiracy against him by the SNP and Sturgeon that basically was kind of set up and they tried to imprison him. And my initial reaction to that is what's their motive? When did Salmon and Sturgeon stop being allies and start being what seems mortal enemies? What's the background there? Well I think it is really important to put this in the proper context because I think the story really starts at least this chapter of it in 2017 and it really was in the context of the global Me Too revelations that were having impact around the world and the Scottish government like Westminster, like other parliaments elsewhere, signed off new processes basically to deal with sexual harassment and crucially this included the ability to look retrospectively at cases including of ministers who are no longer serving. Now this is quite a key point of contention in today's session Parliament. Salmon made it quite clear that he didn't think it was right that the Scottish government did change the rules in this way to allow this retrospective investigating at one point even sort of suggesting that it was kind of against the human rights which is which was quite bizarrely. And as you pointed out this then led to women coming forward and there was the court case last year quite serious charges leveled at Salmon and ultimately the court found he wasn't guilty of criminal conduct although it's I think it's important also to stress that from the testimonies heard in court and indeed from some of Salmon's own admissions it's clear that his behaviour was was deemed well was deeply inappropriate and in terms of times quite exploitative I think by no one's standards never mind from a leader. Salmon's own lawyer interestingly was overheard describing him as a bully and a sex pest as well caught on video as well. But in terms of motive I mean I think so Salmon as you said his supporters are claiming this kind of conspiracy basically a sort of malicious concerted effort to basically imprison him and remove him from public life. That was a very serious claim and obviously you know I'm not a lawyer I'm not particularly close to the case don't have more information than anyone else but I think what's useful to do is to kind of think what would need to hold up for this to be true because what it means is that basically elements within the Scottish government the civil service the SNP the crown prosecutor the media have all conspired to sort of stitch up Alex Salmon in this way and crucially I think the most important thing is that it also means that nine women nine women came forward and basically lied under oath all of them together in order to try and you know stitch them up basically and of course we should you know remember how traumatizing and difficult these situations are for victims to come forward like this and so I think it is a very very you know when you when you look at it that way it is a very very you know to me implausible not impossible but implausible and certainly no hard evidence has been brought to light so far which which supports this this conspiracy so in terms of it being a conspiracy there might not be evidence there does seem to be stronger evidence that Nicola Sturgeon might not have sort of behaved in the most honest way throughout this not that's not to say there was a conspiracy but that she hasn't necessarily always been straight so I want to move on to the the second investigation so that's not what salmon was brought into parliament to talk about today this is led by James Hamilton who's a QC and this refers to whether or not Sturgeon misled parliament as to when she found out about the allegations against salmon so Sturgeon initially told the Scottish Parliament she found out about the complaints at a meeting at her home with salmon on April the 2nd 2018 no notes were made of that meeting but she later admitted that she had in fact met salmon's former chief of staff four days before that on the 29th of March where they had discussed the possibility of Sturgeon meeting salmon to discuss allegations of a sexual nature so that would imply she did know about this before that meeting on April the 2nd Sturgeon claims to have forgotten about that meeting a claim which salmon says is untenable Laurie this claim by salmon that it's untenable that she forgot about that meeting that seems a bit more plausible than the whole conspiracy angle to me is that a reasonable interpretation well I think overall I think it's clear that the Scottish Government and Nicholas Sturgeon perhaps haven't dealt with this very well and I think there have been it looks like there may have been mistakes made it looks at the things that could have certainly and should have maybe been done better procedurally and in terms of them in the key question really is I think has Nicholas Sturgeon or is there evidence that Nicholas Sturgeon has broken the ministerial code has she misled parliament and I think it's not right certainly for me to speculate on this at the moment again I said I don't have more access to information than anyone else James Hamilton's conduct in his investigation on this and we'll just we'll deliver his findings at some point and at that point I think we will know and questions will be asked but certainly I think that this is a very messy situation I think that either way this isn't going to be a clean outcome one way or another it's not a black and white situation I think that you know it's been it's been going on for quite some time and nobody's going to come out well from this and certainly I think that you know Nicholas Sturgeon and the Scottish government you know they lost the they lost that judicial review case and had to pay 600,000 pounds on Alex Ammons legal expenses for example as you pointed out and so I do think that it's messy and it's too early to make sort of solid predictions on that front but we will see in the next few months and obviously we have an election in May coming up so the timing is obviously very crucial here From what I've read one possible outcome seems to be that even though this whole conspiracy story falls apart it does turn out that Nicholas Sturgeon was initially not completely honest about when she did or didn't find out about the case which would mean that she could have broken the ministerial code by lying to Parliament now from my perspective if you've got the most popular politician in Scotland she's you know winning stomping majorities at elections for her then to resign on the basis of having told a lie or you know having messed up a little bit in a complaint about one of her colleagues or her predecessor it seems kind of implausible that she would resign for that but everything I'm reading has suggested if it's found that she's broken the ministerial code she will resign the SNP will have lost its biggest asset and the independence movement will have lost its biggest asset do you think it is plausible that something like that could take down Nicholas Sturgeon and with it you know a huge chunk of the independence movement well I mean the SNP you know as you point out still enjoy massive public support I mean the polls indicate the SNP is on track to deliver a massive majority in May bear in mind they don't have a majority at the moment so that'd be an improvement support for independence has never been higher I mean Nicholas Sturgeon's personal approval ratings are the kind of thing that you know politicians everywhere would envy now that's not to say that events this week or in coming weeks won't have an impact and won't change that but I do think it would take something fairly monumental to seriously hamper in terms of seriously changing things in terms of the the election now in terms of Nicholas Sturgeon and her own future you know the question of breaking the ministerial code obviously there will be if that does transpire that that's the case there will be enormous pressure obviously for her to step down not least from those her political enemies who obviously would love to see Nicholas Sturgeon step down you know we've seen quite a lot of interest from you know her political opponents in this case who've suddenly become you know on you know seems to be supporting Alex Salmond people who would never have previously liked Alex Salmond you know the sort of you know right wing pro-union people down south for example and so I do think that you know historically I think it's probably the case that when people break the ministerial code they're expected to resign of course you know in Westminster we've seen they're not doing that in Westminster you know exactly that's no longer that's not the case and so I do think that I don't think it's a given that that that she would expect to to step down and I mean in terms of longer prospects for independence you know Alex Salmond and Nicholas Sturgeon two giants of the independence movement and have been so far I do think though by this point Scottish independence is so ingrained in a large part of the population now that it is bigger than a leader or one person and so I think that those who who sort of think that if they can topple Nicholas Sturgeon here then that's you know a massive that's the sort of a massive hammer-blotter independence and again for the union I think I think they might well be disappointed in that sense because I do think that yeah I think it's bigger than that by this point Laurie McFarland thank you so much for staying on to talk us through all of this so much to cover you did it very well I've learned a lot just from that discussion so thank you very much we'll speak soon we have just one more story for you tonight before we go on to that please do like this video now if there's anything more surprising than how much we let landlords get away with in this country earning half of people's wages for doing very little it's how they justify it to themselves landlords don't tend to think they are parasitic on other people's work they tend to think they're doing a good thing there was a video of a a very a landlord who lacked self-awareness which was which went viral on Twitter this week we're going to show it and we're going to talk about it let's take a look I work in London I live in Buckinghamshire but I invest up north right now we're in Huddersfield this is Huddersfield you buy a house here for like 80,000 pounds you're going to rent it for 600 pounds in London you'll buy a house for 800,000 pounds you're not going to rent it for 10 times the price so you want to buy low rent high with a property manager nearby people say oh but Samuel I have to buy close to where I live so that I can keep an eye on it if there's any problems that's not financial freedom that's called a rope around your neck you want to buy properties in chief areas you want to rent them high and you want to have systems in place and property managers that can make it passive income so that you can have financial freedom that's called property investing the smart way so sorry I said that was a Twitter video it was originally a TikTok video but it then went viral on Twitter it's had over half a million views Darlia I want your take on this guy I think the thing that's I suppose really shocked people is this idea that is you know he's a weird guy but for any landlord they are expecting passive income they're expecting that you buy this asset and then you just get to slowly collect money and then own the house at the end of it and basically you've had someone who works for a living pay your mortgage I mean even if he's describing it in a particularly vulgar way what he's talking about there is how landlordism works Yeah I mean those of us who grew up in working class black and brown neighbourhoods in London we know this story of gentrification extremely well it was in our communities that you know the tools of gentrification this model of wealth building and hoarding that is based on essentially displacement and breaking communities are what was developed and you know in my years of renting in London I don't think I've ever had a landlord that's lived in my neighbourhood my current landlord and my last landlord both didn't even live in the same country as me and you know we have seen our neighbourhoods destroyed our local sort of businesses our communities displaced and generally just like treated like sort of like dirt like that needs to be cleaned out like literally socially cleansed in order to make way for profitable or productive quote unquote use of the land you know when my contract is up where I'm living now I'll probably be priced out of the area that I grew up in in London and that matters you know it's where my family is it's where my community is it's it's also one of the few places that I really can can call my home and it's really heartbreaking actually and really annoying to see people who 10 years ago wouldn't have stepped foot in my neighbourhood who took the piss out of me for where I grew up now being able to live there when I myself and people that I grew up with no longer can and you know these kinds of parasitic rent seeking practices are practiced on racialized working class communities and across the country and then exported to the rest of the population but and as you mentioned you know this video causes a lot of like shock and disgust because he just says it in such plain terms but it's not an aberration it's it's the norm it's not a bug it's the function of our economy right now and and I think that we've really failed with the exception of like renting movements like acorn we've really failed to to make a political movement our opposition to this parasitic renty kind of capitalism you know and as productivity continues to stagnate which will probably get worse after brexit you know this this what this landlord calls passive income of people who already have capital owning shit and making money of renting out to people who don't have capital is going to become absolutely essential to how our economy runs it's being sold as an acceptable way of making money in what is a very dysfunctional economy and that's only going to entrench inequality even further I mean it is I mean landlawzism I mean it is feudalism isn't it that's why you had you know Adam Smith Karl Marx all the classic economists they thought it shouldn't exist even in a functional capitalist system because these people aren't producing anything basically you have enough capital to buy a buy to let home then someone who has to go and do productive work has to pay you for no reason a third to a half of their income and you don't do anything and people say well I can't I can't lower the rent because then I wouldn't be able to pay the mortgage it's like well why should you be able to pay a mortgage of someone else's work it doesn't make any sense you're not adding anything this is why people say landlawzism is parasitic who say oh that's such a horrible thing to say that's such a horrible thing to say you know there are good people who are landlords who just want some financial security that's true I'm not saying everyone who's a landlord is evil but I'm saying that there is no justification to have landlords in any society because they don't add anything if there weren't landlords people say oh then how would you rent if there weren't landlords the house would still be there it would just be the case that there wouldn't be someone who demands half of your income just so you can sleep there while they still own it doesn't make any sense we should only have social housing and then affordable housing there's no reason whatsoever to have exploitative private landlords it doesn't add anything there's nothing I resent more than paying half of my income to someone who doesn't do any work you know I don't know I don't know if they do any work because I don't have any idea who they are but they're definitely not doing any work to justify me paying them half of my income it makes no sense and this guy while we're outraged at him yes most landlords probably don't speak like that shouting in the middle of the street but he is just explaining a reality which I mean it is the reality of private of the private rental market which is people buy properties for as lower prices they can rent them for as high as they can it doesn't need to have any relationship whatsoever between how much they paid for it and definitely rent has no relationship to how good a landlord they are it's not a market which works in any of the ways that a capitalist market is supposed to work there are no price signals it's not that if you're a bad landlord then you don't get any money so you have to become a better landlord no there's no competition in this market it's terrible and people should join as Dalia said Acorn if you want to sort of help end this scam now talking of scams I thought when I saw this video and we were going to do this this section it was just going to be a react to an exploitative landlord but it turns out that actually I mean he is an exploitative parasitic landlord but there's also more going on here because this man who is called Samuel Leeds is also a con man which might be why the numbers he mentioned in that video didn't quite add up so he runs training courses for how to get rich quick buying properties under his company property investors now in semi religious sort of training sessions they've been described as cult like he encourages people to sign up for courses that cost thousands of pounds so he's saying look I got rich quick you can get rich quick but you can only get rich quick if you buy access to my courses and the sort of personal tailored advice that I will give you so he's basically saying that's why that video looks like that he's saying this is super easy you can get rich like me the problem is that many people don't get rich many people end up disappointed and looking up this guy I found this really tragic article actually the BBC wrote about Samuel Leeds after someone who paid for his training committed suicide so the person who tragically committed suicide was called Danny Butcher he was 37 he'd paid £13,000 sorry for courses run by Samuel Leeds which promised to make attendees financially free you heard him say that in that video as well that's his point you become financially free by essentially getting someone else's income paid into your bank account and which is how landlordism works now the article describes the work of Samuel Leeds property investors which is the company puts on free two-day crash courses offering people the option to sign up to a training academy where they will learn how to become financially free by investing in property and the company described Mr Leeds as having found his own success after attending training courses with his wealth coming primarily from his property investment activity so there you know you can be like me you can get rich easy and not have to work and just you know withdraw the income of people who work for a living it goes on to describe how how Samuel Leeds you know works what he does so Mr Leeds posts videos on YouTube nearly every day promoting his methods in one he joked that he would punch people in the throat unless they subscribe to his YouTube channel in one clip he promises to work one on one with his customers to provide a custom tailored bespoke plan and hold your hand make it happen so that's the really important part there you say you don't even have to you don't have to be smart you don't have to know about property investing you don't have to have loads of capital all you need to do is follow these easy steps and I will hold your hand through the process you can't fail you will get rich unfortunately many of the people who paid money for this course didn't get rich I'd assume the majority of the people who paid for this course didn't get rich and one of them tragically was Danny Butcher the person who who committed suicide after handing over 13 grand of Butcher the BBC article writes Mr Butcher attended a free course in March with his brother-in-law Glen Jones Mr Jones said it felt like brainwashing like a religious cult kind of thing but done on a much smaller scale what he's offering never appears I don't see how it can it goes on according to his wife Mr Butcher's gut instinct told him not to sign up for the academy and he held out for two days before changing his mind swayed by the promise of exclusive mentorship and one-to-one training Mr Butcher's family said he did not get the support he had been promised and as we've said after failing to make any money Danny Butcher took his own life in October 2019 he's not the only person who's had severe problems with this course as there are currently at least 78 people trying to claim back more than 200,000 pounds between them from the company property investors Darlia I mean this guy seems to be one of the most evil people I suppose I don't really like using the language of good and evil but I mean this guy who is actively encouraging people to parasitically invest in poor communities so that they can charge an extortion at rent also happens to be someone who is exploiting people who want to become financially free who doesn't want to be financially free they get on these courses they get sold down or led down the garden path and you know there are some really tragic results from all of this I mean I was blown away when I found this out when after seeing that Twitter video Yeah and I think obviously I mean this actually really reminded me of Donald Trump's like school Donald Trump's university and all of that and that thing about the promising you know one-to-one tailored business advice and this kind of it reminded me a lot as well of the like multi-level marketing kind of what many would say is what many call basically similar to a pyramid scheme and what these models the reason that these kinds of models cause so much mental health stress and mental anguish is not only because the disappointment or the sort of the fact that for a lot of people who turn to these kind of schemes it's because you know there's a desperation for income especially as you know jobs formal employment is shrinking and most you know in work poverty is rising so people even people who are in employment they don't feel stable they don't feel secure from that source of employment and they turn to these kind of things you know whether it's sort of selling little bottles of moisturizers your friends or it's you know this kind of horrible parasitic model of rental becoming a landlord so that you don't have to have a landlord it's not just because of the money loss it's also because the way that a lot and you know they describe it as like a religious cult it's also because a lot of these kinds of cult like money-making schemes rest on this idea that if you if you don't make money out of it if you don't get rich quick it's because of a personal failing in you and it's this kind of self-help entrepreneur kind of positive thinking movement that's really really popular in the U.S. but is also becoming much more popular in in the U.K. as well and it just this kind of part and parcel of this whole package that you know is structured obviously this guy is kind of like a sort of example of this but it's a model of money-making of wealth building based on exploitation based on extraction based on deception on parasitic behavior that is directly encouraged by our economy so whilst obviously he is accountable for the disgusting things he has done it's also important to see that he's not the only one but this is actually a kind of behavior and a kind of wealth building that increasingly making money through being able to provide for yourself and for your family and for people that you love through just a regular nine to five is increasingly becoming impossible so people are turning to exploiting one another in order to try and you know have that sense of security so that's really being encouraged not only by the conditions of our economy but also by the fact that people who are valorized people like Donald Trump are examples of this kind of cult style economic entrepreneur you know cult of the entrepreneur model that is becoming increasingly appealing to a lot of people and acceptable I mean it's also important to say I mean based on the reports that we've presented to you here and what I've read about in the past couple of days it seems in my opinion that this guy is a con man right but it is important also to say why I think he's a con man right based on these reports and that's not because he's telling people they can have passive income and become financially free by becoming landlords because you actually can do that the lie or how he seems to be misleading people from these reports is by telling people you can do that even if you're not rich right because the con isn't to say you can become financially free by buying houses and renting them out for high prices when you bought the house for a low price no the con is saying you can do that without already having a huge store of assets to your name without already having lumps of money that you've inherited or other houses which you can remortgage right so so even though this is a pyramid well this is this is a scheme where you can actually get rich quick but you can only get rich quick if you're already rich you can get richer quick let's put it like that we're gonna we're gonna we're we're not we're not gonna give this guy any more air time but I thought that video was incredibly instructive both you know about our housing market as it stands and then investigating him after seeing it from these reports I mean he does just seem symbolic in my opinion of so many things that are wrong in this country right now let's wrap up there Dahlia it's been an absolute pleasure spending another Friday evening with you thank you so much you too Michael even when we're allowed out even when we're vaccinated I will still be spending our Friday evenings together but maybe in person and maybe we can go get a beer afterwards which will be lovely um and thank you for watching the show if you are not already please do go to navarmedia.com forward slash support donate the equivalent of one hour's wage a month and thank you so much if you do that already also make sure you are subscribed to the channel I presume if you've watched this far you already know that we go live every Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 7 p.m. but if you know by chance you didn't then do make sure you hit that subscribe button so you get a notification when we do and we also put out videos every day for now you've been watching Tiskey Sour on Navar Media good night