Ian Hislop reviews the insanity of 2023

We popped down to the Private Eye offices to catch up with Ian Hislop to mark the release of the 2023 Private Eye annual.

We roll back the months in what has proved to be yet another unhinged year of British politics, touching on the coronation, the scandal surrounding the SNP, the Covid inquiry and Rishi Sunak’s weak attempts to steady the creaking ship that is the Conservative Party.

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Hello pedo right I’m I’m a republican well I mean I’m I’m a constitutional um monarchist and also I had no idea that we had a prime minister who can’t do politics I mean not at all whatever one’s criticisms of the others um they been in politics a bit and knew a bit

How some of it worked Ry sunak not a clue I think he’s getting very cocky I mean I’m he was out there saying yeah I like Mr sta you think well what’s coming next Enoch well he had a few points you know the right thing You’ never had a

Chance to do it well you did you had a chance you had the Prime Minister and we watched we watched student politics in real time and for vast numbers of people in this country they lost a shitload of money in Hislop hello hello how are you

Um yeah good yeah glad to hear it yeah um I like Christmas I know most people don’t but I absolutely love it so I like it um I like the family get together as I like the alcohol and I like it because it would appear to be the annual

Occasion on which we sit down for one of these conversations and ruminate about what’s happened over the course of the Year okay so that’s the best bit yeah obviously for you your Christmas present is me perfect Christmas present um and the reason obviously for the conversation is

Because of the private ey annual um which you’re what holding like a fantastic QVC presenter yeah um available from all good book perers and also from private ey itself can they yeah and some bad book I think probably I’ve got it in as well yeah you can get

It uh uh just about anywhere so please do yeah no it’s um I was thinking uh I mean we tend to do this once a year but events speeding up we could probably yeah we could probably accelerate it monthly perhaps I don’t know um but when

We did do this interview last year 2022 I asked you what the theme of the year was and you said quote the bottom of the barrel yes well we we’ve gone lower what’s beneath the barrel do you think no I thought the theme of the year would

Be it won’t be that bad again um the adults are back in the room it’s going to be calm you know we’ve got a new monarch we’ve got a new prime minister who and you know the Assumption being couldn’t possibly be worse than uh Liz truss or Boris Johnson and then and then

He’s having a go he’s making a good driver isn’t he is you can’t you can’t fault him for effort um and I think that that became um for me the theme of the year was just it didn’t turn out the way I thought at all M um and also I had no

Idea that we had a prime minister who can’t do politics I mean not at all MH I mean whatever one’s criticisms of the others um they been in politics a bit and knew a bit how some of it worked richy sunak not a clue I mean

Literally pick a fight with uh the prime minister of Greece yeah that’s a big vote winner no no it interests no one at all except people who are interested in you know the B and you lose them incredible incredible ineptitude I was going to well let’s just talk about it now there’s within

That Scandal you mentioned the Monarch King Charles then turns up at the cop conference yes wearing a tie emblazened with the Greek flag yes and I I had questions at the beginning of the year about what type of Monarch Charles was going to be whether he was going to be

Interventionist because he does have his own political positions political positions we know about yes in a way that perhaps we didn’t with the lake Queen no do you do you foresee Charles being a more interventionist Monarch do you see him getting into politics a bit

More well so far he seems to be doing mostly gags which is fabulous which is a really good way of doing politics uh I mean his delivery of of the The King’s Speech about um we’re going to go for more oil drilling was incredibly funny

Um uh his face alone just said I don’t believe a word of this uh I mean we had him coming out you know with a banner saying not my speech and it was just really clear and I think that level is quite funny and wear wearing a tie which

Is quite clearly the Greek flag repeated endlessly to meet your own prime minister after he’s just um had a fight with the Greek Prime Minister I thought it was really funny and the the palace saying oh no it’s a it’s a very old tie he’s he’s worn this and it’s just it’s

Very pointed and it’s funny so I would say so far he’s making quite a good fist of that and it also fits into the point you’re making about sort of Plumbing new depths because with Johnson and the queen you sort of go 2019 that’s a constitutional crisis the relationship

Between the Prime Minister and the Monarch appears to be at an all-time low and now they’re getting close to being almost in open Warfare with each other right yeah the last cop conference wasn’t it that sunak said he couldn’t go to and now he’s now he’s at this one

Making a show of him yes and I mean historically people always said well it was the queen versus Mrs thater over the Commonwealth this is when um they were at their most you know in terms of loggerheads but this year because sunak is so unpopular if you’re the Monarch I mean

You’d have to work quite hard to pick an issue um where you were less popular so I yeah I I don’t think that’s going to happen and in terms of you know Time Magazine right every year they stick their person of the year on the front

Cover and I think this year Putin uh and president she are up against Barbie um who for you who’s who’s your person of the year do you think yeah well it’s definitely not Barbie obviously Oppenheimer yeah yeah more of an Oppenheimer guy yeah um uh it’s quite

Hard finding a person of the year this year isn’t it um maybe that’s why Barbie’s in the running everyone says oh when are we going to get a Mandela for the Middle East and you’re thinking I don’t know um but when are we going to get a Mandela for anywhere there is a

There’s a slight um dur Tony Blair offered himself didn’t he for to to resolve of the situation in the Middle East he did but he has he has done it before he was appointed was it once twice Yeah by everyone and and I mean it is quite difficult to resolve I mean one

Of my favorite pieces of the year was King Solomon resigning saying yeah I’m quite wise but I have no clue how to do this uh yeah I mean Blair must think well if David Cameron can come back why can’t I come back I could be foreign secretary

Getting the band back together yeah Pete mandon they’re all they’re all hanging about yeah we’re kind of what do you think that speaks to the fact that Cameron’s back as foreign secretary Blair mandelson back in with K starmer as the labor party do you think there is a Dar of um political creativity

Political ideas in Britain what do you think what do you think is going on there well I think a um no one’s got any better ideas but also we both parties have done the thing which you know in British politics people always do it goes is wrong if you’re on the right you

Say well we haven’t been rightwing enough um and if you’re on the left you say well we haven’t been leftwing enough uh whereas the population is shouting out can you not be more extreme either of you uh so they suddenly think oh the center now who used to be in the center

Oh David Cameron he was he was in the center and was Blair he was oh Center Center Center it moves back that way and I just feel oh God we’ve lost all this time with you telling us how pure your views are and us as the electric but not

Obviously not effectively enough saying can can we not have any more of your very pure views can we have something that works from a philosophical point of view do you think that there has to be a degree of opposition or friction certainly in a you know in a two-party system like the

One that we have where if the only two real vehicles for electoral success coales around an Overton window where there is a high degree of consensus and not a great degree of opposition what do you think the con consquences of that are for our democracy because I’m

Inclined to look at 2019 where you kind of have chaotic socialism with Corbin chaotic brex ISM with Johnson and go well they’re two very different things at least the offer to the electorate is clear you know you’re going to have one or the other yeah and then my view would

Be was can we have neither um which again is probably about no chaos yeah and less chaos and also I mean you know we we had that um attempt to have AV previously but I’m I’m all for having another go at it and I do think the only

Coalition we’ve had recently in British politics was not a bad example of how a coalition can work um and so I don’t have a horror of of changing that so you get and coalitions tend to produce more Centrist politics I mean we know that um because uh apart from it in Israel uh

But yes all right my own argument total rubbish uh but I just I do get the feeling that when you get um you you talk about people believing the same thing there’s almost no one now who thinks that um the railways wouldn’t be better run um if they were re nationalized and

Essentially it’s happening by stealth so some of the when the the franchises come up no one wants to run them the government run them and most of those have done really well in the last year and have put money back into the exer so at every point there is a a feeling that

On both sides but you know both on starma and and what’s left of the Tory party their options for what will work become more limited um and I think personally I’d like to see things that work I I think that’s quite a compelling political slogan not it’s not very

Ideological and it’s not very exciting things will work from from cover of the manifesto um let’s pick up that is the the labor Manifesto isn’t it it’s um compet it it won’t be worse yes to change all right yeah um okay so let’s pick up on what you said there

What’s left what’s left of the Tory party yes what do you think happens to the conservative you know if again political predictions can be a Mug’s Game but it certainly would appear that they’re going to lose the next election quite badly what happens to them do you

Think after that well there is the Canada option um which when the Canadian conserv he went down to what two seats that would be quite funny yes that that would be quite amusing this is back to Politics as gags right yeah no no no I mean I mean it can be

Funny and and pleasurable um and now I think it is extraordinary they’ve had what three or four resets in the last I was going to say week but in the last you know um three months or so and no one’s buying any of it and uh again the

Political pundits they all say oh K dama I mean he’s he’s he’s messed up now not calling for a ceasefire um and then you know there was a ceasefire and so that is you slightly went away and the pole ratings nothing just nothing um uh and I you

Know I think he’s getting very cocky I me he was out there saying yeah I like Mrs Stater you think well what’s coming next Enoch well he had a few points you know you just think will that denst ratings I don’t know yeah I I saw that

And I thinking you know he’s he’s he’s hoovered up so much of the vote now he’s he’s he’s attacking sunak from every single angle he’s gone you know what I’m now going to attack you from the thatcherite right I’m I’m going to take that as well well that that’s an

Extraordinary development isn’t it and uh it suggests everyone saying oh he’s so timid it may be he’s just massively overconfident yeah that’s a possibility how much this sort of malays with the Tory party yeah boils down to the legacy of Bor bis Johnson do you think it’s do

You think it’s a just a 13 years fatigue broadly you know the cycle of government has come to its end and and something new is going to happen um I think there’s there’s fatigue and then there was two very specific things there was covid party gate um and however many

Times they will say uh the Public’s over it um they’re not interested anymore they’re really interested you know people are watching the inquiry and they’re saying the inquiry is now confirming everything we thought at the time which you denied the chaos the parties the irresponsibility the um the

Bodies pile up they let them die they take it RI all of this which you said repeatedly in front of committees and in sing the you all said this wasn’t happening oh oh yes that oh that was happening yes oh yes yes all that uh you know Gove apologizes you know Boris I

Don’t know what he’s going to say say it well I do I mean going come up with a pack of lies and imagine we’re going you know we’re going to buy it but there’s going to be some apologies now and some well you know it’s all very easy with

With um hindsight but again it was all very easy at the time you knew you were breaking the rules you broke them um and people are still cross about that um and there’s not I mean I would say there’s not a week where someone doesn’t say to me me

My grandmother my mother my relative died in a care home and I didn’t get to see them or we had a funeral with five people at it or you know um and again for politicians to imagine that oh everyone forgets that no they forget who you are they forget what policy you said

They forget all the things you imagin they remember they remember the events of their own life that were compromised by your sort of arrogance and incompetence well you mentioned you mentioned Johnson at the inquiry today right he arrives 3 hours early because the co Bev families are planning to

Arrive outside and and pick it and protest it right if you can get hundreds of people to turn up at this thing they very clearly still care about it yes they very clearly still care about it and I think your your point about the personal is is so relevant there and and

Probably in the context of this inquiry happening quite so soon you know chil Cott doesn’t come out was it 2016 I think it was it was right around the brexit referendum right so you know basically gets buried anyway yeah the the evidence gathering for this happening in this public way where you

Know the the chancellor of the ex Checker at the time who is now the Prime Minister there’s still very definite and precise connections right so you kind of get this spectacle almost of current politicians not having the the typical method of an inquiry which is we’ll kick

It down the road we’ll all be out of office it doesn’t matter if we’re found to have lied because we no longer have to adhere to the ministerial code job done blah blah blah but the very that very British way of dealing with something it’s not quite the case here

And there actually looks like there might be a degree of accountability for for their actions and and the point of inquiries I’m used to be you wait for the what will the inquiry say now it’s the evidence itself actually what they come up with in the end will be will it

Be useful will it prevent something else fine that’s all very technical but the the actual effect of the inquiry is blind me look at that look what’s happening now and uh you’re getting the current prime minister um being called do death and uh um his um you know eat out

To Peg out as the a was called it um until a number of young people pointed out that Peg doesn’t mean quite the same now which I anyway we don’t have to go there U but so uh I think again you you you can’t now say well it was all a long

Time ago you literally thought this is a terrible idea you’re telling the public who were all you know know caring at home um because you’d said don’t leave the house uh to um go to the pub and help the economy and and you the advice at the time and it’s great that Rishi

Sunak now says um uh uh we were advised all along and the advisor say no no no you didn’t ask us so again someone’s not telling the truth there I think possibly you know the chief scientific officer might be the one who is probably telling

The truth I I don’t know about you it’s very easy to to judge these things yeah I um I another interesting point out of this for me is the kind of oh sorry your question which I answered at I just did Boris I said the two things that were different with a long

Period of one party in you always get fatigued but we had party gate which I think is uh absolutely infurious people and burst finally burst the Boris bule and Liz truss which is just a in front of a live audience now if you say Liz truss you get an enormous laugh you

Don’t have to do a joke it’s all there she is the punch she is the punch she’s in everyone’s head it’s wonderful shorthand um and if you’re the opposition party any opposition party that’s all you have to say um and no one disputes it so you’ve got literally two of these enormous um

Catastrophes I mean they two of my favorite things the anual one is is uh Boris appearing before a committee um defending himself for having a drink uh with the nanny uh when Carrie was going into hospital and him saying that he kept his distance at all times and they

Were two meters away him and The Nanny and he obeyed car’s guidelines which were do not have a drink with the The Nanny while I’m in hospital so that one still worked and the other one was we did a thing about Liz truss um um being

The captain of the Titanic and coming on afterwards and saying um there was nothing wrong with the course I set it was just the speed straight for the iceberg in the middle of the Atlantic is the way to go it’s just I was too fast yeah yeah yeah slow down take it slowly

And I just feel people they’re not going to forget that one no I don’t think they will I don’t think they will you’re right and the point I was trying to make earlier of people saying oh we’ve you know the left say we’ve never been left

Enough if if only we were just allowed in and to make a mark and the right saying we’ve never had a chance to do it well you did you had a chance you had the Prime Minister and we watched we watched student politics in real time

And for vast numbers of people in this country they lost a shitload of money yeah um and I don’t think they liked it much that’s the thing it’s the it’s the it’s the personal it’s the um you know let’s your pension part is your house or

You know even if you haven’t paid it off your interest interest rates now have spiked to the extent where your mortgages Maybe be increased by 50% or um your your your dad your grandma Whoever has a fall and has to wait 12 hours for an ambulance you know these

Are personal traumatic things yes that when politics is abstract and you’re complaining about small boats or I I don’t know whatever the issue of the issue of the day is you know um Rack in schools that’s actually a bad example because people have kids in schools that are falling down but

Basically as soon as it comes into your life and is direct to you yeah you it’s you’ve almost sort of made the gravest error of of politics which is these people will always remember and never forgive for those things and that is what politics is meant to be about I

Know you know those of us who obsessed by it think it has a a great grand and um sort of eloquent um Superior purpose but in the end it’s meant to people make people’s lives better or or less bad as we now put it that’s what we for yeah this new lowered

Expectation and and that happen so I mean deciding to say address the problem of of we’ve got this terrible concrete that falls apart in schools just before term starts maybe 10 years ago would have been a good time uh and again the Tores and this is what I mean about being bad

At politics if you adopt as your slogan long-term solutions for a brighter future uh and then cancel a long-term infrastructure project um try and address the fact that these schools are falling down and you were told how many decades ago oh yes this concrete stuff oh it’s got about a

30-year life well maybe towards the end of the 30-year life you could look at that rather than the day before term starts just an idea uh it’s just a thought okay um so we we we spoke a bit about Johnson there and there’s uh you know there’s a small matter as well of

The you know the chairman of the BBC having to go yes that was terrific um but the fact that he went was good that was incredibly cheering he actually he actually resigned which you know something you rely nowadays the sort of the done thing is you you you announce

That you’re going to resign but you don’t actually resign you you wait for maybe I don’t know months so that the timing of the by elction coincides very neatly with the Conservative Party Conference that’s generally the thing you do do you meet your constituents no you don’t don’t meet your constituents

Maybe you speak in Parliament I don’t think you speak in Parliament either no but you still haven’t resigned you’re still doing your job it’s very important not that it’s very important to not that and it was you know rather than saying oh I’ve become a distraction uh which is wonderful new I

Mean we never used to have this I’ve become a distraction no you’re just guilty we’re not distracted we’re just looking at you thinking yeah uh anyway he did go and again by going um made it fairly clear that this was yet another it was the end of boris’s uh

Corruption really is it it’s interesting isn’t it to see the the sort of um that degradation of of public standards or or the idea that like you said someone could resign they might go I’m not I’m not up to the job anymore so so I’m off or you know I’ve broken the ministerial

Code so I so I will leave no um I will write a tell all book with characters named after Bond villains and and and and then I’ll resign when I decided and and all because you won’t put me in the House of Lords I mean am I looking at

It’s the nakedness and of the pettiness I mean Nadine Doris and Suella Bran’s exits were about as graceless as anything I think in in modern politics you thought boris’s exit was bad enough um yeah I mean that’s when we ran that cover you know uh what happened to honor

And modesty and he says I never met any of them um but the the immediate attack by Suella I’ve gone um because you failed on a private deal I mean it never occurred to her that the electorate we didn’t vote for you to have a private deal in which your agenda secretly was

The only one that mattered I don’t remember um do you remember rishy talking about transparency that deal wasn’t very transparent uh so I mean that was pretty disgraceful and Nadine Doris was just hysterical you don’t give me a post as an unelected peer um despite the fact

That you know I don’t turn up to my constituency I haven’t done anything I want a free job for life and if I don’t get it I’m going to scream I was dismal the logic of a toddler am I the book is hysterically funny by the way I haven’t read it yet

No well I mean normal people won’t and haven’t uh but I have to say for sheer lunacy there’s this mysterious um B of um shadowy people who undermine every British prime minister um and they’re furiously against um brexit at one point they’re furiously pro at another and then they’re furiously against the

People they were furiously furious with f just none of it makes any sense at all it sounds possibly like the figments of someone’s imagination I think it may be fighting ghosts perhaps and it’s a love story it’s a wrong com it’s a it’s a sad wrong com because

In the end it’s disappointing um but uh no I mean it is incredibly funny and the bond villains again I think it might be slightly a generational thing um it’s not it’s not that clever is it having people called Blow felt or Dr No is one of Dr Dr no yeah

Um again you just think about the doctors who are on strike rather than the other doctors I wonder if I’m am I thinking about the past in a slightly nostalgic way or with ro tinted glasses yeah when I say oh the degradation of public life and you know standards Etc

Is it just a a mirage to suggest that there used to be this thing called decency and that it’s been attacked and corroded over time I think it’s easier to believe that um uh and and probably more necessary to believe that when you’re young um there there are moments

When you think um I mean certainly at private ey I think well ah this is really shocking and then I think ooh 1960s pson oh that that wasn’t very good was it and Harold Wilson’s um resignation honors lists that was pretty disgusting um that was up

There with boris’s in terms of you know just giving Crooks honors and you know Marcia Fork Ender Harold’s mistress dictating who goes into the House of Lords not good not not great and that was 50 years ago so you one mustn’t be too Rose tinted um and the I mean the

Good thing about sort of um being part of a magazine it’s got a long history of doing this stuff is is you don’t get too shocked and too disillusioned every time cuz there is a certain you just ground down yeah no it’s not ground down I mean

I I saw a quote it was from myself the other day which I was I thought that’s very very good that’s so stew that’s so good someone said to me said um you know people who um work in uh at private IR must must be very very um uh sort of uh

Must be very jaded and I said no no I started off Jaden that’s that’s why I went to work um which I thought was a better yeah nice a better so I know I mean I think you you get a sort of optimism by saying

Um yes it’s quite bad but it has been bad in the past and there are times when it isn’t so bad and can you imagine how bad it would be if no one cared no that’s true so that that’s my good Goodwill message at Christmas uh is it

Would be terrible if ulot didn’t carry on looking at it yeah keep staring keep looking there’s power I guess there’s conviction in that the transparent bit is true um the bit everybody hates is when you see exactly what they’re up to yeah uh you mentioned strike action and doctors Junior doctors have just

Announced um I think it’s going to be nine days over the next couple of months more strike action going on yeah um should we be surprised that they failed to reach an agreement with the government I mean broadly speaking I think nurses teachers deals have been

Struck there the RT have come have have backed off now as well I think there’s train strikes today actually that’s a yeah as I think they do it on a sort like tag wrestling isn’t it it’s the rmt no it’s out there two months oh we’re

Back one two one two um why do you think it is that the the junior doctors are still still holding out why do you think they’re one of the sort of last few that haven’t reached settlement with the government um I think it’s because that they were the most annoyed at their

Treatment and I think the last time we spoke I mean I I I again I was was hopelessly radical but I suggested I suggested negotiations might be a good idea with some of these strikes rather than just not meeting people um and most of the deals that have been come to by

The end of the year could have been come to last year um and it’s good it’s great um but the trouble with that the the junior doctor strike and they’re not Junior most of them which is ridiculous misn you’re junior until you’re about 70 as far as I can see in the health

Service and then you retire uh it’s that um uh the nurses settled for much less and obviously the nurses are quite cross about the idea of a deal going higher and the Scottish deal was was lower than this and I I still think they’re not going to get it historic restitution

What 35% they wanted to start with I don’t think the country’s generally in a mood to give anyone 35% really it’s ambitious isn’t it yeah um and I you know as you know I’m I am broadly sympathetic and um uh and I do think they they’ve fallen

Behind very badly but I just think that isn’t going to happen uh in in any real world and I think uh um even a labor government even the next Labor government uh will not be coming in and saying the first thing we’re going to do is offer one sector of the NHS

35% it’s not going to happen so uh what I mean what they can’t afford to do is for everyone to think well we were talking earli about the effect of the personal you know the nurses are fantastic and I had this incredible treatment and we had this incredible

Treat we and then say but hang on this bit of the NHS is still out and it’s still what’s what what is what is happening here um I don’t think that’s sustainable no I don’t think so those waiting lists will just keep getting longer and longer won’t they yeah um you

Mentioned the the disparity there between Scotland which I’m going to try and Hammer a segue towards goodness like the one show come on yes exactly like do it Nichol sturgeon’s resignation in February uh which also happened in Scotland um yeah that’s great so first of all what do you think

The political consequences of that departure are do you think the S&P which I would probably have described as a bit of a cult of personality both around her actually and around Alex salmon yeah do you think it can continue now without her as part of it and also perhaps uh

What criminal what criminal investigation do you think comes a useful face when his time as first M of Scotland comes to an end because they’ve got a pretty good track record now yeah well I I mean I did think it was funny because I think last time I was here I

Was thinking go America can you believe it I mean they’ve got their senior politicians actually arrested how how you know pathetic are they and then we thinking oh dear the entire political class of Scotland have been helping the police with their inquiry say um that that you

Know serves me right really being a bit smug about it um I think it changes everything um and I think there were Nicholas sturon was not only a cult of personality in Scotland but it also outside Scotland it gave a lot of people in opposition in England a chance to say

Oh if only we had someone as brilliant as Nicholas sturgeon um and uh it’s because everything hopeless uh here and uh we we we need this wonderful sort of system they have in Scotland and Scotti people would say well have you heard about the ferry Scandal you know yeah we

Still haven’t got two boats we’ve got one after eight years does it have a does it have Windows they painted on don’t worry it on so there were a lot of people and they criticized the education system which you know it takes a long time for news to get through Dr drug

Deaths drug deaths you know all of that M which was pretty pretty poor um and so a lot of that got brushed under the carpet by people saying oh we hate Boris and we think Nicholas sturgeon is marvelous well it turns out uh she wasn’t marvelous um and uh the set of

Excuses that the lead I don’t want to um I don’t want to get myself up on a contempt charge uh yeah having been warned repeatedly in my career this this is not a good idea people you’re often you’re often intro as the most sued man

In in England AR you yes I mean that is that true that it was true it’s not true now because you know the liel um uh business largely collapsed and all the lawyers now do um confidentiality privacy um and reputation management um reputation engineering engineering yes um and

That’s where all the hassle comes um and so I I do spend a lot of time still with lawyers but it’s they’re much clever now the Lial laws changed everything and the internet you know people as you know were much happier to Lial each other

Openly um I mean I was going to start off by saying hello pedo and then I thought no maybe maybe I won’t do that maybe that’s not fair the great test for us now is whether or not we’ll include that in the video can can

Can we do you for liable if we publish it ourselves is an interesting one actually yeah well no feel free to cut it out I’m just being childish uh I actually quite liked it to be honest with you um but that as as you people are that I mean it’s very difficult to

Police the internet and lawyers don’t do it much so people get away with much more so lials become um much more sort of diffuse people don’t tend to do it and partly they don’t do it because they’re much more effective ways of doing it which is shut people up long

Before publication you know the slap business those orders coming in stopping things and people saying to us you know we say well you’ve been awarded this government contract and um you don’t seem to um have any competitors and you’ve taken 8 billion pound profit and you haven’t delivered anything they go

It’s confidential we can’t mostly comment on this and then you’re expected that’s meant to be the end of the story very good yeah of course naturally absolutely we’ll go home now and write something else and those are the issues now now um or you write something about

Someone and say um well that’s that’s um that’s my private business I’m saying it’s not terribly private is it why you’re oh yes no very very um it will badly affect the mental health of many of my illegitimate children uh if you point out to any of them uh and you just

Think so those those that’s much more than liable nowadays it’s one of the I think most appealing things about Britain for the kind of oligarchs the the the autocrats Etc who house their Assets in this country right in London whether they’re they’re they’re Russian whoever and it’s not just Russians right

It’s the the the the private school system in and around London the the legal system which allows them because people you know there’s a huge amount of debate always about endlessly Free Speech cancel culture Etc we actually have one of the most restrictive I would say you know in terms of maybe not

Liable is how you describe it anymore but certainly the sort of the lawyering of free speech it’s very advanced in this country and and it’s one of the things I think that makes it most appealing to people who have things to hide to bring their assets here to buy

Property here or to live here yeah because they can cover up their wrongdoing more effectively than they could let’s say in America but there’s been very good you know couple of years um in terms of the movement against it and um um you know this this is going to

Hurt but David Davis the Tor MP has been incredibly good on this um and whatever his views about brexit uh um uh we can all get over it and he’s fantastically you must got over it by now otherwise you’re like Dominick Cummings would say you’re one of those Japanese holdouts

Right on an island just by yourself fighting a war that’s long past coming out of the Jungle going have we rejoined yet I mean he he has been terribly good and there have they have been very very good um you know that uh um anti-s slap movement in terms of making people aware

That it won’t do to have London as a place where you can shut down books and articles and it’s it’s always about money M you know it’s it’s this is what this is about it’s about where this money is where it goes and what it’s used for also very good uh bit of

Positive recent news it’s um The High Court ruled that it was reasonable to call Ian Duncan Smith Tory scum so you know that’s that’s a good bit of yeah now he’s he he’s mentioned in um Nadine Doris’s book is he yes um and he’s one

Of fighter no he’s he’s one of the few people that doesn’t have a code name and I think that’s cuz nobody knows who he is quite possibly it is a code name um okay what what have you had hassle for this year what’s been difficult in the private offices where’s there where’s

There been some controversy well I mean covering um domestic politics is never as difficult as covering Foreign Wars um and there’s a point at which you’re saying well you know at what point is war death famine plague you know how funny are they presal magazine you have to cover them you have

To make points if you think there are points so um that continued and the Middle East has been uh a recurrent um you know sort of uh I say Minefield but it is uh uh you know throughout the eyes history and uh this Garen war was no

Exception um and so uh um I put a a a cover on which was a text cover um which again offended a lot of people including um uh some of my friends and uh uh uh some other people but I think in this was the um the warning

About the magazine may contain some criticism of the Israel government and may suggest killing everyone in Gaza as revenge for Hammer atrocities may not be a good long-term solution to the problems of the region yeah and that infuriated some people um some of our readers said what you’ve stated the

Bleeding obvious uh and now I mean X weeks later I think that text is exactly what American foreign policy is so I’m now pretty much lining up with is ‘s major Ally so I I do think there was a real overreaction and the word Hamas atrocities appears on the front cover

Yes it is not unbalanced and it doesn’t it says the Israeli government it does not say Israel so I was I mean I don’t print things I don’t print things I haven’t thought about really uh and I had thought about that and that’s what I

Wanted to print and um I you know I didn’t retract it but um it was very uncomfortable and the there was pressure to retract it oh a lot of people said you know you should apologize you should um put something else in and I just said

Well you you must look at the rest of the magazine you must look at what what we run um and you know we um if you look over the course of the Year there is a piece about how Grim it is um to have Hamas as your government uh and a very

Long list about there historical uh record um internally there are pieces about some of um the Arab neighbors whose whose generosity and love of the Palestinian people is not terribly convincing limited sorry limited describe it yes yes somewhat limited so I mean attempting this goes back earlier

To to to try and find um uh something to say that is is um measured balanced whatever but still you know we are a hysterical magazine exaggeration is part of it um and attempting to to make a point is part of it so no it continues

To be incredibly difficult um but uh um I think that’s that’s sort of incumbent upon us but so that that that was that was fairly hard but I mean I mean not compared to you know living in North London and being Jewish and being very frightened or living in Gaza and

Thinking um I’m going to die you know being in the media trying to think of something to say is not it’s not that bad really yeah of course of course I would say the the thing about it that was I think the reason why it was so powerful

Right is because as as if you if you interpreted it as a literal statement what can you argue with you know it’s it’s and as a result the the the level of provocation and the level of outrage from what you would think was a truism what you would think is just taken as

Rope right it becomes as much a commentary about the British media and the analysis and discussion of what’s going on as it as as much as it is about the merits of the statement itself that you’re putting on the front page yeah and you know I

Have no time for people who you know go on marches and have pictures of hand gliders of course on their back or uh uh organizations that used to be prescribed in Britain and I would prescribe again being allowed to go on The Fringe of the

March and and um try and inflame it but you know the very large number of people went on those marches whose desires are I think um uh for a solution and peace and they are not there I mean to have you know uh the Home Secretary talking

About a hate March um is pretty offensive to a large number of people on AB um and to then incite a literal hate March you know the following weekend right at the Senate half yeah well if if you if you if the people are most vocal in your support are Tommy Robinson and

His mates around the Senate half and again we try again I did try and point this out a couple of other times you know this was a march on Armistice Day and technically the meaning of armistice is is a period where you you put down your arms which you could translate as a

Ceasefire certainly yeah that’s one interpretation yeah um and you know the end of the first world war and the end of of many subsequent wars were not not huge triumphs uh for anyone um they were an end uh and so um again it it I mean it is very

Difficult to try and try and make sense because it’s a fantastically complex and newon um historical problem and there’s not a great deal of History taught and newor isn’t very popular at the moment particularly not on social media so fashion yeah uh those two things were were not very useful

This obviously it’s a huge point of of conversation right but the way I it’s always fascinated me that the thing that looms large particularly on armis this day and uh on Remembrance I feel the first world war occupies more of a space in our national Consciousness than the

Second world war and I I put that down to the tragedy of it I put that down to the tragedy of the PSM um of passionale of EP of you know take your take your Battlefield take your your combatants the the the horror of the Mass Slaughter

Right yeah and that I would associate them with Remembrance Day the sort of the sense of Shame around about the way that that war was conducted the sort of the BL arrogance of the way that those oftentimes boys were commanded and sent out to their deaths and on those days

That’s what I think about right I think about the horror and the shame around it and in maybe it’s recent maybe I’m just doing that thing again where I’m slightly younger so I think well back in the day it wasn’t like this but the sort of the fetishizing of the poppy of remembrance

And that instead of it being this very somber sad moment it instead becomes an opportunity to project your own and an and and an analyze the patriotism of others and I feel like that was the undercurrent with the with the Suella stuff and the March and then izing the far right it wasn’t

About humble respect of the Fallen because otherwise they wouldn’t be no it was nothing to do with it at all um and uh I agree I mean I I’m obviously very obsessed by the first world war and I wrote a play about it and I I did a

Series of documentaries about it and I find it incredibly poignant and I I I’m really interested by you know the 1920s in Britain you know most people had lost someone um the casualties were stack agging um and someone once described Britain as being under a cloud of

Mourning for a decade and you can’t understand the Jazz Age or or the explosion of God can we find something to be happy about you none of that makes sense unless you remember just how enormous this event was and again I don’t I don’t have this with a poppy I

Mean I wear a poppy and I’m very um very keen to do so and um but you know at various points um there was a a veterans March um on armis day where they all um because of unemployment they all threw their poppies away and put their um uh

Uh doll tickets in there and then they marched on various town halls I there was a wonderful event where in uh um one of the northern cities uh the uh Council had organized a a big um Remembrance Day dinner and not invited any veterans uh and the you know this won’t surprise you

So the veterans had turned up smashed in the window of a piano shop taken a piano out and started playing we’ll keep the home fars burning and then set far to everything um I should laugh at this this this is a sort of Remembrance Day event uh by people who were there who

Were very cross the way they’d been treated when they came home so as you know I’m very boring about it but I just think the more history you know the more you have a chance not to make stupid generalizations that don’t mean anything there’s there’s a yeah a strong a strong

Strain of that radicalism and and obviously pacifism as well of having experienced the horrors of War yeah to say never again you know the second world war was um extraordinary in that it was an incredibly reluctant War um there was the declaration of war in the first world war had young men running

About overe excited joining up uh um sort of young women kissing everybody inside everyone saying this is going to be marvelous uh the first World War uh the second world war you know the church bells rang the Arch Bishop of Canterbury said I can’t believe we’re doing this uh

The politicians said we don’t want to do this nobody nobody wanted to do this which made it a completely different type of War um and uh the way it’s conducted was different and and it was just um and I think that’s partly why and partly why because um uh by the end

Of the second world war and certainly after the discovery of of the camps and the holocost this became a justifiable War as a as a concept and the first world war no one no one could really do that at the time cuz uh even the victory seemed very Hollow there are people who

Still still argu the opposite right that actually there wasn’t a certainty that it had to happen and the whole thing could have been been avoided right this yes and and again in the uh there was a very the description of of armist St in the trenches which my friend Nick and I

Used in the play was just of they stopped it dead and these two young officers Roberts and pieron who we wrote about looked at each other and said is that it then and then they shook hands and then they told the men to get down

Just in case the guns on the other side didn’t uh keep happening and everyone was just quiet thinking right no no march to Berlin then no no that’s it we’re going home now right how’s that so it I mean it is what was all for sorry yeah what was all for

Um and I me in the end so often these things you know I’m I’m very moved by what they went through I’m moved by what they did I’m moved by their their commitment I’m moved by that generation really um and their innocence and and their their extraordinary fortitude and

Uh and uh you know also this why we wrote this play the WIP time sorry this is just getting up off but just it was a a trench magazine which was um a satirical trench magazine produced on the front line at EA by these two uh brilliant young officers and and they

Had a sergeant who’d been a printer in the war produced this fantastic thing and they just they were so funny I me they an advert in the first issue which said um uh we’re offering a taxi service um because you know obviously you want to get home uh and um we’re running a

Fleet of taxis they’ve got a big red cross on them so uh if you need to get home uh just shout for what 1916 yeah I mean that’s their joke and the these are men who are risking their lives you know anyway I’m very um where did they get

The Press from sorry where did they get the Press they found it it was abandoned um in Era they found it in the basement they were looking for Salvage they were a Pioneer division uh and they went in and they’re about to smash it up uh and

The prin said no this this works I could make this work and being British officers instead of saying so what they said we could produce a satirical magazine right here away we go um we we’re coming to towards the end of our time me it feels I’m talking about the

First world war at enormous length it feels like we should it feels like that should be a separate conversation perhaps another time um let’s just let’s talk about the coronation then before before we wrap things up um man in hat sits on chair yeah uh again we occasionally do these

Text covers but it did seem to me that when you get that much coverage of anything it’s incumbent on us to point out what’s actually happened MH and and that’s what it was and he he sat on the chair there’s there’s part of my part of

Me is inclined to to to think that way right I’m I’m a republican I you know I’m sort of slightly put off by the whole thing and then I S I actually I watched it and I didn’t think I would was that or I think it was the Emoji Movie on Channel

5 or I think with the were the two options so I went for the coronation and I did actually find it quite um instru fascinating that you’re sort of watching this the abst the abstractions of the British constitution come phys become physical and one day you see the

You know everyone’s there everyone stood there and the the order and why why does this happen and you know no we won’t be able to reuse any of the footage now but Hugh Edwards sort of in toning saying well and that’s so and so and that’s why

They’re there and this all this and I actually found it quite quite fascinating in a way I didn’t expect to I thought I was going to be quite put off by the whole thing well I mean I I’m a constitutional um monarchist and and I

Get more so the more I look at our politicians yeah quite useful having that here um and um obviously I mean I I love all of that stuff um and I love the fact that almost every bit um of of that flamy has been put in by some group in

The past in order to keep the monarchy in order uh and you think well why why why have we got people from the Scottish Church there because they insisted at the time and they said the second thing he has to say is about Scotland yeah and

That’s it there is no choice they P that ginormous Stone down the stone of Destiny yeah it’s there yeah and I mean I I was I love the second verse of the national anthem we say oh people say oh why are we saying God saved the king um

And then the second verse goes may he preserve our laws and ever give us cause and there’s huge and if he doesn’t we’ll kill him uh uh it’s fairly straightforward uh he’s only there on suffer um and there are laws they’re not his and you just think oh right I mean

Quite a lot of this stuff is there in order to make sure the man who sits on the chair and waves and and wears the hat does just that and no more doesn’t get any ideas no and then the rest of the service I mean it was a fantastic

New Anthem at the beginning um was it McMillan I think and I thought and I’m very Ser I love that I thought the music was absolutely fabulous I thought the sense of humor putting Harry behind um this enormous feather on his sister’s head was incredibly funny um that made

Me laugh a lot uh the fact that he has a giant oven glove that he sort of puts I mean Penny with that sword Penny with a sword fabulous straight out of his Greek costume drama I’m Game of Thrones really wasn’t it it was and it was also again I

Mean it sort of it’s The Sword in the Stone the person who pulls the sword out is the leader and she clearly thought I am King Arthur I am King Arthur but sadly well it hasn’t gone her way yet not yet but you know I’m my one of my

Favorite writers is Alan Bennett um who was part of the original big 60s movement you know and he wrote Beyond The Fringe and endless brilliant plays and he once said he was sitting writing in his study and he heard the rehearsal for a trooping of the color you know the

The regiments when the lake Queen there preparing and he said um I thought to myself how incredibly silly and ridiculous and then he said and then I realized I had a lump in my throat and I feel the same about it it makes me laugh and I find it all

Strangely reassuring I mean on the coronation day I went to one of the High Park where they’ve got the huge thing and uh um you could watch it on television it was peeing with rain and there was absolutely vast turnout of people and I thought oh what do we think

About the British public so the king Qui Alum then they cheer um there’s a shot of Andrew at the side the entire crowd starts booing and I think this is brilliant this is why I like the British public you know because they do news and they

Do we like that no we don’t like that we’re not taking the package we’re not going to be told um and if we want to come out in the rain and cheer we’re not going to cheer everyone he can do the Greek flag on the tie but he does if

He does any more than that we’ll start we’ll start no no and again there was during the braan period I’m sorry to be boring about it but it’s just she was talking about disrespect and um um uh uh crowds protesting and I thought when George III

Opened Parliament he was met by a moob of people who threw turds at him I mean we don’t have an enormous history of respect in this country we have got quite a long history of open protest um and I think it’s worth remembering always yeah and it’s perhaps

A sign of where we are that you know the the sort of quite restrained and moderate descent that we have in this country is now viewed as kind of something quite extreme because it’s very it’s very distant from those protests that you mentioned in the past

It is and and a public order act which suggests that most protests should take place in the ory um on a weekday at 11:00 in order not to inconvenience anyone that’s not really the point of protest it’s not Ian his up thank you so much for your time really appreciate it thank you