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July 20, 2022 - Uncensored - Piers Morgan
44:55
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Disruption vs Human Distress 00:14:39
I'm Piers Morgan Uncensored tonight.
Climate protesters this morning declared the M25 a sight of civil resistance and caused total chaos for motorists for hours.
Two of the activists will be live in the studio.
And the two most sanctioned countries in the world, Russia and Iran, have declared themselves a single fortress.
I'll be asking the US Navy SEAL who killed Osama bin Laden, as well as a former UK sea lord, if today's West have the Gahonis to face down those two countries.
And not for the first time, Penny Morton flops out this time of the race to be PM.
Liz Trost and Rishi Sunak now go head-to-head.
Well, good evening.
Welcome to Piers Morgan on Sensor.
Climate protesters might be pretty irritating, but they undeniably have a serious cause.
You could say we saw a bit of that yesterday when we experienced the hottest day in British history, and recorded history anyway, and there was a surge of wildfires right across the country, causing huge damage.
So how do these protesters go about winning hearts and minds for their cause?
Well, this was campaign group Just Stop Oil's answer today.
Activists climbed gantries on the M25, blocking it and causing nine-mile tailbacks, causing, of course, extensive misery for many motorists.
The group first made the headlines back in March when they stormed BAFTA's red carpet.
Then it was football's turn as they attached themselves by the neck to goalposts.
There was also disruption at the British Grand Prix with protesters having to be physically dragged off the track.
In early April, Just Stop Oil managed to literally stop oil, blocking tankers around the country from delivering petrol, causing a week of shortages at the pumps.
And recent weeks have seen our guests tonight glue themselves to the Hay Wayne of the National Gallery and others attach themselves to masterpieces by Van Gogh and Turner, as well as The Last Supper.
I'm joined now by Just Stop Oil co-founder, Hannah Hunt and protester Eben Lazarus.
Welcome to you both.
I suppose my reaction to this is that I don't dispute you represent an important cause.
Never have done.
I believe in climate change.
I think it's serious.
I think we're seeing the impact of that all through Europe at the moment in a pretty dramatic manner.
I guess my problem is the way you're going about this, because I'm not sure you're winning hearts and minds.
I think you're actually having the opposite effect.
And that's my problem with it.
I think the kind of cultural wanton damage, I think, you know, hijacking sporting events, I think the motorway stuff we are causing huge disruption to so many people, it's, I think, annoying a lot of people more than it's bringing them to you.
What do you say?
I mean, so Piers, if you agree that there's this huge issue right now, then you might also agree that no new oil and gas licenses, which is what we're asking for, is a no-brainer.
It's in line with what the International Energy Agency, the IPCC, the UN are all asking.
It's in line with the government net zero targets, right?
So that's what we're asking.
It's a no-brainer demand.
And we have to do whatever we can to force the government to implement this because otherwise we're on a course bound for more summers like what we're seeing this week.
Right.
I mean, Hannah, I'm not...
The government doesn't seem to be paying much attention to you guys attaching yourselves to paintings or disrupting sporting events or disrupting motorists going about their business, some to very important things.
I mean, the government aren't paying attention to us and nor are they paying attention to the severity of the climate crisis.
I mean, this week in the hottest week of weather we've seen in British history, on Monday, our UK judiciary ruled that the government's net zero plans for 2050 are unlawful.
So the real true criminals here are our government.
They don't care about the situation or the severity at all, Piers.
But do you care about the disruption you cause ordinary people who've got nothing to do with this, who are trying to go about their lives, their business, and you're disrupting them.
You're causing them a lot of misery.
Do you care about them?
I mean, Piers, have you seen the disruption that the heat waves, the fires are literally engulfing houses in London?
Have you seen the strains at NHS?
They are on a black level alert.
Have you seen the strain to where our fire service they've had the greatest sincerely?
I know.
I'm asking you, though, about the disruption you cause ordinary people who might well support the general cause you're representing, but don't understand why you want to cause them so much distress.
Do you understand the distress you're causing some people?
So, my personal view, my distress, you know, you're asking me about my distress.
No, no, I'm asking you for my understanding of the distress.
Are you aware of quite the scale of the kind of distress you cause when, for example, you bring motorways crashing to a halt?
If we do that, there may be people.
Hang on, let me finish.
Let me finish.
That there may be people who are actually trying to get to incredibly important things.
Do you care about them?
Piers, come on, look at the situation we're in right now.
We discuss it at the beginning.
I'm asking you on a human basis whether this is a proportional response to what is going on.
That wasn't the question.
You know, with respect to both of you, I've said I agree with the cause you're fighting for.
It's the methodology I have a problem with.
And I just wonder whether you have understood.
But you keep, throughout all these interviews that you and other members of the media have with people, you keep throwing out this methodology thing.
But if you look at the...
I just asked you whether you care about the distress you cause people.
Listen, we care about any distress that is caused to anyone.
That's what we're trying to prevent in doing this.
Because if we don't stop the government opening the 40 new oil and gas fields that they have planned, then the amount of distress and suffering and death that is coming is unimaginable.
To some people's misery is worth preventing other misery.
Is that the calculation you've made?
Piers, you're just coming in with these questions again and again.
You know you're going to get the same answers from any of them.
Why don't we actually a very specific question because I have another guest here, Amanda Bishop.
Amanda, good evening to you.
Good evening.
Where have you come from today?
I've come from my mother's funeral today.
Your mother's funeral.
First of all, my deepest condolences to you and your family on the loss of your mother.
Obviously, a hugely important day for your family.
Hugely.
And you wanted to give your mum a great send-off and give her the funeral she deserved.
How old was she, if you don't mind me asking?
She was 90.
She died on her 90th birthday.
So she had an extraordinary life which you wanted to pay proper tribute to today.
We all did.
And what happened?
We basically got stuck in traffic because of the protests, illegal protests from what I can gather, because unfortunately, my mother lived very close to the M25 and that's where the hearse left from.
And as a consequence, we were so delayed in traffic that we actually missed our allocated slot.
I've seen the pictures here of the car behind the hearse showing the hearse stuck in traffic.
And as a consequence, you miss your slot.
We missed your heart.
So how long in the end was your mother's funeral?
A very, very quick 10 minutes.
And my mother was a meticulous timekeeper.
Meticulous.
And I understand her best friend couldn't even get there.
Couldn't even get there.
And it caused an enormous amount of issues for us, not least because we didn't feel that we could pay her the tribute that we wanted in the time that we did.
But we had all the other arrangements that we had for the rest of the day were really put out.
I mean, I understand why young people are concerned about climate change.
I understand why they want to protest and so on.
I don't understand some of these methods they're using.
I don't think they understand the implications and the consequences of what they do.
I think you've just perfectly explained one scenario, which has been repeated, I suspect, many times over today.
Yes.
How do you feel about it?
When you see the protesters here and they respond the way they do, how do you feel?
Okay, well, I'd really like, I hope I would give as balanced a view as I can because we understand that climate change is a pressing issue.
But I think to do the things that you did and to endanger, forgetting all the delays that happened to people today, actually, we got on with our day.
You did not disrupt our day at all.
You disrupted it, but we still felt that we managed to pay a tribute that we wanted to to.
And I'm sure every other driver and everybody else you inconvenienced today felt the same thing.
But if I was married to one of those police officers whose lives you were endangering today, I would be less impressed with that.
Particularly when I can see a tweet from you that you're very happy with all the firefighters risking their lives yesterday and in admiration of them, but on the same token, you're allowing police officers.
And some people I'm sure would have said you should be able to protest illegally like that and just someone should have just left you there.
And why should we all get disrupted if you are knowing that you are breaking the law?
Okay, what's your response?
Firstly, I just want to say I truly am sorry for disrupting your day and also condolences.
I really am sorry.
I want to try and look at the bigger picture here.
And the criminals are our government.
They're investing in new oil and these 40 new licenses that they plan to open by 2025 is a death project and they are failing to protect the people of this country, which is their fundamental responsibility.
Well, can I just say, and I hear what you're saying, and I have three young children of my own, young adults, and I also understand that actually what you're trying to do when you make change is actually build and bring people with you.
And it's a skill to have, a really big skill.
And if you don't have that skill, it's easy to do the things that you're doing to try and get some shot tactics, but actually you're not bringing about change.
And even though you might think that the government are the criminals, I at least elected them.
And if I don't like them, I can elect them again, either to not be in power or choose somebody else.
I didn't elect you, and I don't necessarily agree with your politics.
I mean, Piers has an 11-year-old daughter you have, older daughter, and she is voiceless right now.
She cannot elect someone in power to choose what her future looks like.
And her future, by the time she is my age, there will be drought, there will be food shortages, and worse summers than this one.
So unfortunately, it's for the people we have to act who cannot vote to elect.
Right, but here.
Okay, but look, Emily, look, here you have a woman who's tried to say goodbye to her mum, who's 90 years old.
It would be the most important day potentially you've ever had in your life, I would say.
And ends up with 10 minutes, a funeral lasting 10 minutes for her mother.
And that's directly because of the Stop the Oil protest, which shut down the motorway.
The best friend of her mother couldn't even get there to say goodbye to her great friend.
Do you feel any sense of remorse about that when you hear it?
I mean, listen, firstly, my deepest condolences as well.
I think the problem is here is you are talking about electing and re-electing governments, but we don't have the time for that.
So if we're talking about the net zero targets that the government have put in place, which the judiciary have just ruled unlawful, that's in 28 years' time.
And our country is burning.
Okay, we've literally seen that this week.
We've seen people die because of the heat, and it's just going to get worse.
The whole of Europe is burning and is on fire.
And there are ways to make that point.
There are ways to make that point.
What we have to do is generate the political will.
Determining how many people are going to die and suffer over the coming decades.
We're talking about what kind of a future your children, your children.
Would you write our government care right now?
I mean, how draconian would you be?
Would you cut the oil off right now?
What we're saying is no new oil and gas.
If it was down to you, would you cut it off right now?
No, that would be total chaos.
But by the government's own reports, we have eight years of oil and gas reserves left.
That's plenty of time to transition away from that into something that's sustainable and that actually gives our generation a future.
I mean, we're already seeing the impacts.
This isn't something that's going to happen in 10, 20 years.
Do you really think members of the public are going to listen in any way, shape, or form to you when you do the accent that you do and you're breaking the law?
So how can you give any advice that's compelling or build an argument and bring people into that argument and try and persuade them when you're actually talking about it?
This is the point.
You see, I looked at all the reaction, right, on the news stories, on all the websites.
I looked at the social media reaction.
It was almost universally hostile towards what you're doing.
Not to the cause you represent, but to the methods you're using.
It was relentless hostility.
You weren't bringing hearts and minds.
You were actually driving them away.
And that's my problem.
I don't think what you're doing is working.
I think it's having the opposite effect.
It's getting you short-term publicity.
It's getting you on shows like this.
But when people hear this kind of story, they're like, who the hell are you guys?
Frankly, to be stopping this lady from going to pay proper tribute to her mother, to holding up a hearse on the way to a funeral so they miss their slot.
Who are you to do that?
You're deciding what you think is more important, whose lives you think are more important.
And I say to you, I'm with you about the cause.
But Pierce, when I hear that the lives of every future generation on this planet, what is more important than every single person?
I think every life is as important.
Exactly, yeah.
Including Amanda's mother.
And we risk losing all of that.
All of it.
Every life on this planet.
Where does your disruptive tactic stop?
Are you going to keep gluing yourself to things and stopping sporting events and lying in motorways?
Where do you go with this?
Do you get ever more extreme?
Do you get ever more disruptive?
And what do you hope to achieve with it?
Because at the moment, I'm not saying anything.
I mean, listen, until the government make a statement that they won't invest in new oil and gas projects, then we will continue to cause the disruption because that's what history has proven can create the societal change at the speed and scale required.
Some people would argue that's a form of terrorism.
You are trying to intimidate the public.
Escalating Climate Protests 00:07:11
Suffragettes look at the civil rights.
It's totally different.
It's not.
That is a total.
The suffragettes were able to build that movement.
It was a movement.
You're so right.
It was a movement of people and it had a huge, great amount of support for it over a long period of time.
If you think people supported the suffragettes at the time, you're wrong.
People hated the suffragettes like people hated the civil rights.
But they'd still managed to make changes over time.
And if somebody did go down with their ship like Emily Davis, and at least somebody, she did that.
She did that.
I don't necessarily agree with what she did, but she did it.
What I object to is you risking the lives of everybody else.
I think a lot of people feel that way.
Hannah, I mean, how far do you take your personal accountability?
For example, your social media, I'm told, is full of pictures of you in far-flung places having great holidays.
I presume you didn't swim there.
So you're taking a lot of planes, are you?
I mean, I thought you might bring this up.
We'll show you some of the pictures.
I mean, this is you in hotspots around the world, which I presume you've...
Piers, I was a child there.
I'm 16.
Do you not fly anymore?
I'm 23.
I do not fly anymore.
When was your last flight?
I mean, those are photos from when I was 16.
Oh, it's a strange question.
Do you fly anymore, aren't they?
No, I don't fly anymore.
You've stopped flying.
I truly believe that when you know the information and then you can act, it's our moral duty, if we know this information, to determine what the future of humanity is going to look like.
And that's pushed for no news.
Part of the problem, again, with the debate is you hear a lot of high-profile celebrities and they say climate change, carbon footprint, environment.
You know, Meghan Markle and Prince Harry, two great examples, and they constantly use private planes.
We've seen Kylie Jenner revealed, I think, yesterday, for using one to go seven minutes.
There's actually a guy now doing a website where he monitors the use of private jets.
And these Hollywood guys use them literally like cabs.
And I suppose the problem with that again is if they feel that the people preaching most about this are doing the complete opposite, again, it has the opposite effect.
It just annoys people.
Piers, I was a child there, and I think this shows a message that there is no, it's never too late.
We can turn it around here.
We have two to three years to sort the future of humanity.
And I hope that it shows that I can turn this around in, what, six years since that last fight?
If there were people on the motorway today who weren't going to a funeral, but actually were prevented from getting to a hospital and died, would you have that on your conscience?
I mean, you're all about life, preserving life.
Look at how many people are dying around the world.
It's not about in this world.
It's not about the harvest.
But look at the reality, Piers.
The reality is...
You're a respected and experienced journalist.
I agree.
Look at the reality of what is happening.
It wasn't the question.
Why are we talking high-profile?
Because you never answer the question I ask you.
And I think you should.
You should be more direct.
My question was: if there are people literally losing their lives because you bring motorways to a standstill and they can't get urgent medical treatment, how do you feel about that?
Because you're all about apparently preserving life and you may be costing life.
Is that a price worth paying for you?
Listen, we don't want to inflict suffering on anybody.
Right.
Of course.
But you are doing that.
No, there's been no incident where that's happened to somebody.
So you're talking pure hypothetical when people are actually highly likely that's going to happen if you carry on.
That's the point.
And my question is...
What's even more likely to have 3.5 billion people who are currently in danger because of the climate crisis?
That's not highly likely.
That's certain.
Those 3.5 billion people are in danger.
One billion people are on the verge of starvation in India and Palestine.
So you're going to keep going right now.
You're going to keep going?
With these protests?
Yeah.
And you think it's going to bring people around and get them on your side?
It's not about bringing people around.
You know, people can see the terror and the horror of what's going on right now.
And people can, and, you know, these people.
And we've actually got quite a lot of support from these things.
You know, after the Hay Wayne action that we did, we had the school where the Hay Wayne's base reaching out to us, the head teacher asking us to come talk to them.
Doing yourselves to masterpieces isn't going to save the world.
You might think it does, but it's not going to.
It's just not going to.
People just go, look at these idiots.
They're doing themselves to paintings.
They don't think, oh, I must go and join the Gauls.
Do you know what the suffragettes did as part of their tactics?
They slashed the Roqueby Venus.
And actually, about five minutes before we went and did that, we walked in the room next door and we looked at the Roqueby Venus.
So you're saying that these tactics work, but you're also saying that you admire and respect what the suffragettes have done.
I didn't say that.
I didn't say that at all, actually.
What I said was what I object to is you comparing yourself to a movement that might be entirely different.
I'm simply objecting to anybody who does any illegal activities that endangers life, whether it's somebody who's trying to get to activity as well.
What about targeting China and India, who are the main polluters in the world?
Well, you laugh, but have you been over there?
Do you try and protest there?
No, you don't, because you'd be locked up, right?
So my point is, what is the UK is like 1% of the problem.
China is 33% of the problem.
India, massive whack of the problem.
Why don't you guys take your protest to where the real...
This is my problem with people like Greta Thunberg.
I don't see her marching around Beijing.
And that would have far more effect to me if you guys got on a plane and went and did all this stuff and try to disrupt China and India.
That would make probably far bigger global headlines.
But you won't do it because it's too difficult.
What we can do is make change in our country and other people around the world.
Changing our country isn't going to change the bigger picture.
If our government opens one new oil and gas project, they've failed their net zero targets, which we've already established are unlawful.
We really have a final word to you, Amanda, given you've had this extremely difficult day.
I really do feel that you've got a stronger sense of your own importance and your own mission.
And rather than you are not winning, as Pierce says, you are not winning hearts and minds.
All you're doing is antagonising and annoying and breaking the law.
And that really is the reality of it.
And for any other organisation and in any other country, as Pierce says, we wouldn't tolerate it.
And why we're doing it here, I really can't say.
It's like a difficult day today.
I've got to leave it there.
I'm so sorry for what you've been through today.
My best to all your family.
Thank you.
And I'm sure even within the 10 minutes, you paid your mother a great tribute.
What a life she led.
Thank you, thank you.
90 years old.
Amazing.
Thank you both for coming in.
You know, like I said at the start, I'm kind of with you, ideologically.
I'm just not with you about this kind of stuff.
Can we go and have a drink at some point and continue this conversation?
I think it's a lot bigger than this.
I think the conversation is important.
The conversation is important.
We'd both really love to talk about it.
We'd like to engage in that.
All right.
Good to see you both.
Well, I'm joined now by my Piers Bank, talk TV host Julia Hartman Brewer, journalist Jenny Clemen, and Conservative author Douglas Murray.
Douglas, let me start with you, because I can see you chomping at the bit over there in New York as you heard what was going down.
Now, your reaction to that debate.
Well, I mean, it's extraordinary.
Scientists vs Politicians 00:05:10
All of these extinction rebellions, you know, just stop oil and these groups, and they just remind me of nothing so much as end-time cultists that we've experienced in Britain throughout our history.
If you look at the diaries of Samuel Pepys, you had people in the 17th century whipping themselves, walking around the streets, telling everyone that they were going to burn to death within a few years if they didn't confess their sins.
I'm sorry, but everything I've heard from your guests earlier, apart from that poor woman who was not able to get her mother's funeral, the people from Just Stop Oil, they just are end-time cultists.
They tell us all we're going to burn.
They are willing to do anything, anything, no matter how disruptive, no matter how dangerous, simply to get their own way.
And we heard it from their own mouths.
They said, we don't have time for the democracy game.
Well, I'm sorry, but what do we call people like this but extremists?
Wild extremists who will do anything to pursue a goal which they're frankly, among other things, wrong on.
They're not just wrong tactically, they're wrong about the facts.
Jenny Clemen, can you put up a defense?
Well, I would say the Falun Gong have been meditating outside the Chinese embassy for two decades and they don't get invited onto your show to talk for half an hour about their cause.
Their tactics work.
They have got the attention they want.
They're protesting for a digital age and they're getting their message out and it's very effective.
And I think, you know.
When you said the tactics work, I mean, all right, they get on television because they do what many people think of puerile stunts, which sometimes have incredibly serious consequences.
But I'm not sure they work in the sense of persuading people to join their cause.
So how do they work?
Well, I think they anger the people around them when they're protesting, but their message goes far and wide.
And this is how people protest when everybody's on Twitter and Facebook and Instagram.
Their message goes far and wide.
And perhaps it's not going to convince people who are already convinced.
Perhaps it's not going to convince people who are staunchly for the other side.
There are lots of people who are making up their minds.
And particularly at this time, after two incredibly hot days where records have been broken across the country, it seems like quite a smart tactic.
Yeah, but I mean, Julia, I mean, that's the point, isn't it?
We've had two days.
It was pretty extreme and a bit disconcerting that we've broken our records.
But like, if you take France, for example, they were having stuff like this back 20 years ago, which was equally horrific that summer.
And it goes on.
And, you know, I do not dispute for a moment that there's genuine climate change going on and the planet is heating up.
I've seen enough evidence to prove that.
My problem is, if we're going to try and deal with this, we've all got to come together.
This kind of activity, it seems to me, has the opposite.
I thought we were going to start singing Kumbayar at that point.
No, I think we should have a political debate about it.
You've been to the point they're not going to persuade people.
They're very clear.
I've spoken to enough of these protesters.
They don't intend to persuade people.
They want to bully people and threaten people and force people.
They compare themselves to the suffragettes.
The suffragettes had to resort to some violent tactics because they didn't have the vote.
These people have the vote.
They have the right to stand for election, to persuade us, cajole us, and convince us to government.
What if politicians can't?
Because we don't believe that.
All right, but playing devil's advocate.
What if the politicians are not actually stepping up?
Well, then they themselves can stand for election.
We don't do it over Brexit.
Politicians weren't.
If all the top scientists, most of the top scientists...
No, no, it's not all.
No, it's not actually.
It's not remotely all.
Most of the top scientists.
It is actually.
Most are all willing to speak.
Most are all willing to speak out because if you do speak out on the opposite side of the debate, then you simply lose your career.
Here's my point.
If you're young and you're angry about what's going on and you believe a lot of eminent scientists who say we are voting potential catastrophe and you think your government is not stepping up, then what are you left to do?
You should stand for election.
It's the idea that because people aren't listening, we have the right to stop other people going about their law-abiding business and to force governments to do something.
They say we need a conversation.
We talk incessantly about this issue.
Let's bring in Douglas, yeah.
Also, Piers, if I can say so, who are the people you would go to last for some long-term projections?
I would have said people who'd been on the planet the least amount of time.
We're talking here about people, we're talking here about people who don't know that it was hot in the 1970s in the summer.
1976 was a pretty hot summer.
They have been told, they have whipped themselves up, a portion of this generation, into believing literally that they are going to burn to death within their lifetimes.
They are lying to themselves and lying to other people.
They are whipping themselves up into a fury.
And here's the thing.
There are actually consequences from the adults listening to the kids.
Look what's happening in Germany and in France.
Look at the dependency on Russian gas.
Look at the way in which France and Germany, through short-termist, green-imbued policies, have ended up firstly being completely in hockey Vladimir Putin.
And secondly, seeing what many of us said was going to be the consequence all along.
Look at the German Green Party.
That's one of these radical parties.
Recently, they've had to admit, oh, we do need oil and gas.
The next step they're going to have to do is, oh, we need nuclear.
Yes, because that's what happens when you grow up and learn.
Johnson and Truss Divide 00:10:48
Okay, let's bring in Jenny.
I mean, you can see what's happening in Sri Lanka, for example, where the government came in and they tried to go down a very aggressive green policy route, and now you've got all hell-breaking lists.
Well, that's because the economy is in a state.
I would say that young people are the people who are going to have to live with the consequences of our inaction.
That is the truth of it.
They are quite a long time ago.
Yes, but they're going to live nothing good than you.
People who are younger than you will not live.
I don't know the state of a lot of them.
And I think they have a right to feel very frustrated.
There are a lot of vested interests in the world whose priority is not tackling climate change.
We don't want to be dependent on countries that are quite grubby, countries like Saudi Arabia and Russia.
We need to find alternative sources of energy for a variety of political.
Most people don't want to burn to death.
Most people don't want to burn to death.
They're not going to either.
The problem here is we're talking about young kids who have been indoctrinated into an incredibly extreme ideology.
As I say, we would have recognised them during the Protestant Reformation.
We'd have recognized them during the Inquisition.
These are people who believe they need to do anything to achieve their goals because they honestly believe they're going to go to hellfire in the next six months.
All of their time trajectories keep on being proven wrong.
All of their methodology does nothing but irritate the general public.
And all of their claims about the speed with which we can get off fossil fuels are flat out wrong.
I would listen to these people last.
Okay, well, let's come back after the break and discuss possibly something even more incendiary, which is the Tory leadership race where they're all basically trying to kill each other.
We're down to the last two: Liz Truss and Richie Sunak.
How bloodthirsty will it get?
We'll talk to the PAC again after the break about this.
And Kate McCann, there she is.
Having a searing argument with Julia about COVID, but we'll come back to that another time.
You wouldn't believe what goes on off-air on these shows.
Welcome back.
Either Rishi Sunak or Liz Truss will be the UK's next Prime Minister.
Penny Morton was knocked out of the Conservative leadership race today.
Meanwhile, terminated Boris Johnson, signed off his last opponent's questions, of course, by invoking Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Well, Kate McCann, talk to you these people, joins me now live.
So I suppose the words I least want to hear right now are: I'll be back by Boris Johnson.
Yeah, you know what?
Even Jacob Reese Mogg, who is a staunch supporter of the current Prime Minister, didn't say tonight that Boris Johnson would be back.
He said he wouldn't bet on it.
And I think, look, number 10 officials were asked this question over and over today after that sign-off from the Prime Minister in PMQs.
And they were tight-lipped.
They wouldn't even say whether he will stay on as an MP.
That's the big question here: whether he sits on the back benches and torments his, well, the person who will take over from him in number 10, like Theresa May was doing today.
Because Boris Johnson, who was giving his final parting speech in the Commons, was watched over just a few rows back by Theresa May with an absolute face of thunder today, Piers.
I mean, she really was very, very angry with him.
Ice cold.
Ice cold.
But then she's got no truck with Boris, obviously.
She did eventually stand up.
I think she thought they were clapping her.
So, look, we're down to the last two now, and they're kind of ideologically quite different people, aren't they?
I mean, you've got Liz Truss, who is all for cutting taxes, small government, everything else.
You've got Richie Sunak, who's been in the job in a very difficult period, and he believes the only way actually to get us out of this economic slump is to fix the economy, curb surging inflation, and it may mean it to put up taxes first to do that, as Margaret Thatcher did actually early in her tenure, and then you cut the taxes once the economy's back on an even keel.
But they are very different positions and it may be that the Conservative membership who now decide which one will win might be more tempted to go with someone like Liz Truss with the message of, I'm going to cut all your taxes.
Yeah, I think this is the big unknown and it's the huge gamble for these two candidates and actually the one that the party was really chewing over in Westminster over the last 24 hours particularly because when it comes to what Liz Truss is offering, even economic experts have warned that she could do some real damage to the economy, certainly more than any of the other leadership contenders.
And remember, we're talking about conservative members.
They are naturally conservative.
They don't really like things that shake up the economy.
They like to keep that safe.
But that said, they are frustrated because their man, Boris Johnson, came into number 10 riding high, a pretty hefty majority with big plans to make significant changes and was completely unable to do that largely because of COVID-19.
So they felt that they haven't really got what they paid for.
They didn't necessarily get the government that they voted in.
And so they're tired and they fed up and they want to change.
That could mean that they vote in Liz Truss.
And in fact, a YouGov poll of Conservative members, those who will vote in this election, shows that she would trans Rishi Sunak.
And interestingly, Piers, he's just put out, in the last five minutes or so, a new campaign video tonight of him watching that result come in, and his main message is, we need to remind our members that I am the one who could win the next general election and that's what we need to have in our sights.
The question is, will that message be more important than his economic one?
Well, I was the one who went this all started the leadership race.
I tweeted it will be Rishi v Truss and I said Rishi will win.
So far I've been spot on.
I am pundit of the year and I'm standing by my initial prediction.
But it's going to be very tight.
There'll be a lot of bruising wigs up and down the country trying to persuade this 140 odd thousand people.
I think it is, as you say, all very conservative which way they should be going.
It's going to be fascinating stuff.
Kate, great to talk to you.
Well, let's pick up now with my pack.
Conservative author Douglas Murray and talk TV host Julia Hartley.
Brewer journalist Jenny Kleeman.
Douglas, interesting choice we're left with now to be the next prime minister.
What did you make also, of Boris Johnson hinting he might be back, Arnie style?
Well, I'm afraid I don't believe it for a moment.
I think Boris Johnson will probably be looking to make some money outside of politics.
Not being able to make money whilst being prime minister has been one of his gripes.
I think he'll try to sign book deals, get get columns back, give highly paid speeches and that'll be that.
I'm not quite sure how many people will want to hear from him after this.
By the way, as I said to you, I think, last time Piers, my feeling with Boris Johnson in general is that the laughter has died.
You know what?
You know what Douglas, though it's interesting.
I got a email from a very distinguished television broadcaster today I won't name him regular viewer of the show, one of the greats and he thinks I'm completely wrong about Boris Johnson, that this has been a terrible mistake and that actually there may well be a time when people realize it was a terrible mistake.
I don't agree with him.
Well, but it was interesting to me.
There is a body of people out there that still like Boris Johnson yes, I mean here.
So here's the thing I mean.
As I said in my spectator column this week the, the Conservative Party, has a reputation for ruthless efficiency.
I think that's half right.
It's ruthlessly inefficient as a party.
Look what they've just done, they've got rid of the leader who got them the largest majority since Margaret Thatcher, and as I say, I mean at least the people who plotted and killed Julius Caesar had a kind of plan for what to do afterwards.
The idea that the Conservative Party yet again has knifed one of its leaders, as it always does, and then offers us Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak.
I mean, do they really think that the country is going to be engulfed with enthusiasm for this?
Well, you are speaking from a country.
You don't mind me saying, Douglas, you are lurking at the moment in a country where they have Joe Biden as president and Donald Trump threatening a comeback.
So I'm not entirely sure.
Things are better across the pond.
Oh, I know.
And it's not rosy anywhere, Piers.
Johnny, I mean, on a positive note for the Conservative Party, it's been the most diverse lineup of contestants ever compared to Labour who just keep electing middle-aged white guys.
Well, yeah, I guess you've got to get your positives where you can, but I don't feel very positive looking at any of these guys, which we all knew it was going to be these two.
This seems to be the last gasp of a party that is out of ideas.
It's the same old people with a less entertaining face.
And the country is crying out for some really new ideas and big leadership.
We're going to have six.
But is Kier Starmer that guy?
Is Kiers Starmer the great breath of fresh air that people are looking for?
Kier Starmer has more ideas.
Recently, the Conservative government, their ideas have been Rwanda and let's bring back imperial measurements and then also stealing ideas from the Labour Party when it comes to taxes and windfall tax and all the rest of it.
So I think that it's really depressing that we've got 0.3% of the country who get a say, but neither of those candidates are very...
Well, that's the way the system works.
Julia, who do you think would be a better chance of running the Conservative Party to actually get re-elected in the next election?
Of the two candidates?
Of the two candidates, I think realistically, I think Rishi Sunak in terms of the appeal to floating voters, because remember, it's not conservative voters or party members or Labour Party members who actually win elections.
It is floating voters.
And look, there's no doubt at all.
The whole non-dom tax data of his wife, that's been a really big issue.
Failure to...
I saw that really cut through.
No, I don't think it will.
I think it cut through with a lot of people and it'll be played out by Labour, but I don't think it's going to matter so much.
A lot of this is going to just be about televisual appeal.
And a lot of that's, I think, I think that's going to be the key thing during the next campaign as well.
What I find fascinating, though, is the diversity issue.
It's absolutely fun.
It's funny.
If you actually look at that, these were two white men who were competing.
The left would be all over it about the nasty racist party.
The fact that through no quotas whatsoever, it was women and people who are ethnic minorities and it wasn't an issue and wasn't brought up by anyone on the Tory side tells you quite a lot.
It does.
It's very interesting.
It's going to be very interesting which way we go as a country.
I still think Rishi Sunak is the...
I've always felt for a long time in this government, he's been the best intellect in there.
And he's got the best background.
He's Mr. Furlough, so people do have warm feelings towards him because there was a time when we were all completely panicking and he came in and gave.
And he did it with calm.
I think you want somebody now, after all the chaos of Boris Johnson, you want somebody who can actually become...
Ukraine War Sanctions 00:04:11
I've got to leave it.
I'm sorry, Pat.
We're running out of time.
We had a lot of time tonight, so we're run out of time.
I'd lovely to see you.
Thank you very much, Douglas.
Thank you very much in New York.
Much appreciated.
As always, great to have you.
Well, Vladimir Putin has made his first major international trip since the start of the war in Ukraine to meet with the presidents of Iran and Turkey.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei endorsed Putin's wretched war in Ukraine at the summit.
The Ayatollah told Putin that if he hadn't started the war, NATO, the dangerous creature, would have done it anyway, eventually.
So this is a chilling new axis of evil and how does the West handle it?
With me now, as the former head of the British Royal Navy, Admiral Lord West, I'm also joined by the Navy SEAL who shot Osama bin Laden, Rob O'Neill.
So two unbelievably well-qualified people to talk about all this.
Admiral, great to see you.
Thank you very much for coming into the studio.
What do we do about this?
You've now got Putin continuing to wage this monstrous war in Ukraine, now in cahoots with Iran, Turkey.
What should we be doing as the West?
Well, it's important what our action about this should be.
I mean, what's interesting is Putin, of course, the black day for Putin was the collapse of the Soviet Union.
We know that.
And he's never really accepted that.
And he's got himself into a position of power.
He made it very clear he doesn't accept that places like Ukraine, and indeed countries that were in the old Soviet Union, should not still be under the sway of Russia.
He's made that very clear.
So we shouldn't be surprised what he's done.
He also feels that Russia was really pushed down into mud.
It was treated badly.
He wants to sort of stride the world stage.
He first got a chance to do this because of the Syrian crisis.
And this is another opportunity.
He's able to go actually meet people who will like him, you know, striding the world stage again.
He can sell this back into Russia to the people in Russia that he's doing these great things.
And of course, there are a number of things that he really would like to do.
One is that he wants to somehow break the sanctions.
And there's no doubt Iran will do whatever it can to help there.
Erdogan has been trying to come up with some scheme to move wheat from Ukraine and could be very useful.
But again, Erdogan is not, you never quite know which way he's going to jump.
I was delighted he didn't stop Finland and Sweden joining NATO.
That was good.
So he's a little bit more tricky for Putin to control.
But again, the Iranians are very clear.
They want their sanctions to be eased because they are under a great sanctions regime.
The JCPOA, which was the agreement to try and stop Iran enriching uranium, fell apart, of course, during Trump's time.
So you don't have Iran that wants nuclear weapons, Russia that has them and wants money.
It's a pretty awful cocktail.
It's quite worrying, I have to say.
Rob O'Neill, I mean, when you look at it sort of logically, you're looking at this.
I'm getting a bit twitchy about what's happening here because you're seeing a lot of these nefarious countries coming together.
And whilst a lot of people here in Europe may be outraged by what's happening in Ukraine, it's clear that they're not outraged in Iran.
Yeah, I agree with the Admiral, too.
This is Vladimir Putin trying to show that he can operate even with the sanctions on him.
He's going to Iran, who's got sanctions on them.
This is not all that Vladimir Putin's doing, too.
He's trying to work in the Americas and Africa and with China and Asia.
And he's trying to prove that he can do that.
And even with President Erdogan from Turkey in there, here's someone that's selling drones that are armed to the Ukrainians that are killing the Russians, but they're all proving it doesn't really matter to them because even though Turkey's a part of NATO, I would say that they're the most risque part of NATO and who knows what they're going to do when they have the Bosporus Straits and all that.
But Iran supposedly had an agreement.
They weren't going to get nuclear weapons.
They're going to do what they always do.
They're going to lie to us.
They're going to lie to NATO.
They're going to try to make nuclear weapons.
And Putin's greatest blunder was Ukraine.
And people should be concerned about it.
But if I'm in Europe, I'm concerned that someone is potentially terminally ill and as narcissistic and psychotic as Vladimir Putin.
He's got his finger on the button.
He's got a lot of nuclear warheads at his fingertips.
Right.
Admiral, how do we stop it?
What should we do?
I mean, a lot of people, I'm one of them, I've got to say, had arguments with some of the military and my own family about this.
But NATO is the most powerful military force we've ever seen.
Do we just sit back and watch Putin do what he wants to do?
I think what we've got to do is keep supporting the Ukraine.
Guns, Nukes, and Settlements 00:02:52
We need to give them the weapons that they require.
The longer, I'm afraid the war will go on and it's very easy to...
But is there a tipping point where we have a moral duty to attack him?
And that's a very difficult thing to identify.
I mean, I think I was about to say, I mean, the really sad thing, a difficult thing is we're letting Ukrainians die because that is actually a way of grinding down the Russians.
But the Russians have got huge forces.
You know, they're using a sort of meat grinder operations in the Donbass.
There's no doubt that his original aims, Putin's aims, had fallen apart.
I mean, he made a major miscalculation in this, but he always said he wanted to do this.
And what will happen, I think, is that Putin will take over all of the Donbass, and then he will start making approaches.
look, let's stop this fighting.
The Ukrainians will be exhausted because of the number of deaths they've had.
I don't think they can retake any of these areas.
And they will come up with some sort of settlement.
That settlement will be quite dangerous because it won't be something that will stop the Russians doing this again.
I don't know why.
My problem is if NATO keeps blinking because we're worried about him using nukes, I'm not sure what stops him.
Rob, I want to just, before we finish, just want to talk to you quickly about this Evalde school shooting report, which came out, which was pretty horrific.
You had 400 good guys with guns, supposedly, none of whom went into that classroom to stop that shooter slaughtering 19 kids.
But it also, there's been a procession now of deranged young men, 18, 19, 20, getting their hands on AR-15s legally and so on when they can't buy a beer.
Is there a moment in all this where something needs to be done about the ready availability of those kind of guns to impressionable young minds?
Well, you know, there definitely is, and something does need to be changed.
The problem is, and I don't have enough time to cover it right now, we're at a point now that I don't like the red flag laws because I do believe that sane people can have guns.
I like having guns to defend myself.
But we're also at an age where like if a guidance counselor or a teacher sees someone who's crazy, they're afraid to say that this person's crazy because then they'll offend someone because we've also lost the First Amendment.
You can't say something about someone with offending them.
You might end up in a lot of trouble.
We need to be able to identify someone.
I don't have a problem making sure sane people get them.
I don't want insane people to get them.
But I also agree in order to stop force, you need to meet force with force at the point of origin.
And it comes down to identifying crazy, but then having adults like hopefully you and me in a room who can talk to each other instead of worrying about who's the lobbyist, who's the politician, who wants power to get re-elected.
Have a real conversation.
Yeah, I completely agree.
And I think you're a very important voice in all this because everyone knows what you did with a gun.
So this is, you know, my brother was a British Army Colonel.
It's not about guns themselves.
It's about who should use them.
Rob, great to talk to you.
As always, thank you very much.
Admiral, great to have you in the studio.
Thank you.
Really enjoy meeting you.
That's it from me tonight.
Whatever you're up to.
Keep it uncensored.
Good night.
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