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Sept. 5, 2023 - Uncensored - Piers Morgan
47:07
20230905_piers-morgan-uncensored-kwasi-kwarteng-one-year-on
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Did We Recover From The Budget 00:14:09
Tonight on Piers Morgan Uncensored, one year on from Liz Truss, have we recovered from the budget that broke Britain and are the people that dragged us into the mire sorry for what they did?
Kwasi Kwateng was the brains behind the lettuce, the Chancellor whose policies self-imploded.
So tonight, I'll ask him if he will finally apologise to the British people for the financial hurt that he and Liz Truss caused them.
And a 22-year-old British student's been killed in a Russian mortar strike while fighting for Ukraine.
I'll speak exclusively to his family.
Live from the news building in London, this is Piers Morgan Uncensored.
Here's Piers Morgan uncensored.
Good evening from London.
Welcome to Piers Morgan Uncensored.
Hundreds of schools across the country have had to close buildings over dodgy concrete that's left them in danger of collapse.
It's become a full-blown crisis for the government and an early Christmas present for fans of lazy metaphors.
Critics say this government's crumbling before our eyes.
The walls are falling in after 13 years of Tory rule.
They failed to fix the roof while the sun was shining.
We don't yet know why it took so long for the government to act.
We don't yet know how long it will take to fix it.
We don't yet know how much that will cost.
But what we do know is that absolutely nobody is to blame.
Here's Prime Minister Rishi Sunak accused of cutting school budgets when he was Chancellor.
Are you to blame for what's happening now?
And do you want to apologise to parents and people?
I think that is completely and utterly wrong.
Not me, Gov, says the Prime Minister.
Gillian Keegan, Secretary of State for Education, first said it was, quote, not her responsibility, before blowing up in this hot mic tarade.
But you're saying that the government is not responsible, ultimately, for the safety of children in school?
The school building's responsibility is with local authorities and multi-academy treatments.
Does anyone ever say, you know what, you've done a f ⁇ ing good job because everyone else has sat on their and done nothing?
No signs of that, no?
Everybody else was sat on their asses, says the education chief, who was sat on her ass on holiday in Spain when the school closures were ordered.
Well today her department triumphantly tweeted, most schools unaffected.
Well that's great news.
At least we know the line after the election.
40% of Tories lose their seats, most unaffected.
This crisis has exposed a phobia that's gripping politicians around the world.
It's the fear of taking responsibility or saying sorry for anything.
President Biden said it was quote not his responsibility when classified documents were found piled in his garage next to his beloved Corvette.
Asked if you take responsibility if the Taliban retook Afghanistan, Biden said this.
Don't you bear some responsibility for the outcome if the Taliban ends up back in control and women end up losing the weapons?
No, I don't.
Look, do I bear responsibility?
Zero responsibility.
And yet it was entirely your responsibility, Mr. President.
Everybody knows what happened over in Afghanistan, the tragic consequences, not least for millions of Afghan women now being suppressed once again by the Taliban wolves.
Boris Johnson infamously bore no responsibility for literally anything, including an investigation that found he'd lied to parliament about COVID lockdown parties and launched a campaign of abuse against his critics.
It was all a terrible witch hunt, he said.
Donald Trump's the godfather of taking no responsibility, a former president who'd apparently rather go to jail than admit he lost an election.
And a year ago today, Liz Truss became Prime Minister for a disastrous and historically awful 44 days.
Her friend and Chancellor Kwasi Kwateng broke Britain with a mini budget that tanked the pound, crashed the markets, blew up mortgages for millions of people.
Well who bears that responsibility?
Who's sorry?
It's pretty clear that most people are now still paying the price, but apologies there have been none.
Trust in politics is at an all-time low because so few politicians just want to throw their hands up and go, it's on me, Gov, and I'm sorry.
Every leader blames the guy who messed it up before them and the one who made it worse afterwards.
Look, it's hard to admit you're wrong.
Apparently, I've been told that.
But if politicians want to rebuild trust, it starts with admitting they broke it in the first place.
And occasionally just saying, I'm sorry.
It was me.
Well, I'm joined now by the former Chancellor, Kwasi Kwasi.
Quasi, great to see you.
How are you?
You've never said sorry.
I've never said.
What happened a year ago?
Just over a year ago.
What I've said, I bear responsibility for it.
Why not say sorry?
And what I want to do is to make sure that we actually get back to a growth agenda.
What do you bear responsibility for?
Well, I think the way that we delivered it and the speed with which it was delivered was wrong.
And I've put up my hand frequently and said, we should have taken more time.
We should have had a more balanced approach.
And I've said that repeatedly in interviews, on television.
I'm really curious why you've never been able to bring yourself to say the simple words, I'm sorry, after all the damage that was inflicted by that ruinous 44-day regime of Liz Truss.
And I'm sure that you would say, and we'll come to this, a lot of it was on her.
I'm not here to apportion blame.
I mean, that's one of the reasons why.
But if you take responsibility for cash.
That was one of the reasons why.
I get it.
If you take responsibility, why are you also not prepared to say sorry?
So I think there's a, it sounds like a loyalty distinction, but I think there's a difference between saying I was responsible.
Sounds like a bit like a camel.
And then the distinction.
Because actually, a lot of the debate, and you've probably been following this, if you look at things like slavery and reparations and all of that, all of that is all about saying, I'm sorry.
And in those instances, the people themselves weren't entirely responsible for that.
I agree that that happened two or three hundred years ago.
I agree with you.
I don't see why people today should be apologising for the behaviour of ancestors 300 years ago.
But you were the guy.
No, but again, as in government, there are lots of different people, there are lots of different agencies, lots of different people who are involved.
So it doesn't make any sense.
It doesn't make any sense for someone like, for example, Jillian Keegan to say sorry when there's all of this stuff happened over many decades.
And there were lots of things.
Hang on, but let's talk about the mini budget.
Let's talk about the mini budget.
There were lots of things that were going on.
You say it crashed the pound.
The Federal Reserve had put up interest rates and the Japanese yen and the Euro were at 50 years.
But the main reason the pound, as you know, the main reason the pound tanked as rapidly as it did.
For a week.
For a week.
But the main reason the market's freaked out because you had these billions and billions of unfunded tax cases.
And where the straw that broke the camel's back was actually the guilts.
It wasn't the currency market.
It was actually what we call the LDI's long-term guilt market where interest rates went up and there was a run on that and the bank intervened.
My own view, I mean, I didn't sack myself.
I wanted to stick it out and see it through.
The Prime Minister took a different route.
But you accept that what you did was a massive mistake.
So I think that the delivery of it was a mistake, left a lot to be designed.
Having 45 billion of tax cuts that haven't been funded, even to a sort of non-academic financial brain like mine.
So it looked like leaner see.
No, but it was a straw that broke the camel's back.
So she campaigned very clearly not to increase a corporation tax leadership and to reverse the NI increase.
And that was 35 billion.
And where we went too far was probably in trying to get rid of the 45p rate.
So the point about the reason I think principally it went wrong was that there was just too much in it.
And on top of that.
But quasi, there was immediate harm to millions of people and the coverage.
It was a very turbulent was another person's more.
I accept that.
And I've also openly said that I was exposed, ironically enough, to that as well.
I mean, lots of people here.
So here's my question for you again.
I'm really sorry.
I'm not going to come here and say, wear a hair shirt and apologise and say sorry.
Why not?
Because I want to look forward and I want to...
I'm sure you do, but I want to look back.
We're a year old.
I don't think that's coming.
But the reason I want to look back is Rishi Sunak was in competition with Liz Trust to be the prime minister at the time.
And he warned when she was talking about all these tax cuts she was going to do, he warned this.
So I don't think the responsible thing to do right now is launch into some unfunded spree of borrowing and more debt.
That will just make inflation worse.
It will make the problem longer.
Let's be clear.
We have inflation because of our monetary policy, that we haven't been tough enough on the monetary supply.
That's the way I would address that issue.
But it is wrong.
Interest rates up.
Mortgages nightmares.
It is.
It is.
Liz, we have to be honest.
We have to be honest.
But borrowing your way out of inflation isn't a plan.
It's a fairy tale.
Well, he was right.
I think he was right to an extent.
He was right completely.
No, no, because I think where she was right, where we were right, was identifying growth.
And that will be an issue that you will have endless conversations with politicians in the next few years.
Because it's very unclear if you have a very high tax system, which we're currently in, how you get growth.
I think where we went wrong, and I'm very happy to confess this, is there was just too much too quickly.
I think if she'd done the measures she campaigned on, I think we'd have been okay.
And of course, you've got to remember that this was on top of the energy intervention, which cost billions.
No, no, listen, there were lots of other things.
Yeah, yeah.
I'm not disputing that.
I just, I find it interesting that politicians today find it increasingly difficult to just say sorry.
So when the consequences of their decisions and actions, you were Chancellor, she was the Prime Minister, when the direct consequences were felt immediately by millions of people.
As I said, I think there's a different...
But why are you so impeccably opposed to wearing the hair shirt?
Because you just apologise for everything.
I mean, literally, you would apologise.
No, you don't.
There are many things I don't think we should apologise for.
I mean, you are a moderate, you know, reasonable person, but politicians were always being.
No one's called me that either.
You've got to be, you've got to be, you ought to apologise for this.
You've got to apologise for that.
Were you the shortest living chancellor in history?
Well, actually, Ian McLeod was, but that's a different.
So you're the second shortest living person.
Hang on, hang on.
Shortest living chancellor in history.
She was one of the shortest principles.
The shortest prime minister.
44 days of mayhem, right?
She couldn't even outlast a lettuce.
So on every metric of political life, putting aside everything else, the pair of you will go down in history, whether you like it or not, as disasters in that period, right?
And I simply ask, given the magnitude of...
So I'm not coming here to formally apologise.
Why not?
Sorry.
What I am saying is responsible.
And there were lots of people.
As you said, I know you don't want it.
I'm just curious.
As you said.
Quasi, I'm curious.
Why not?
And as you've said.
Why not?
There were lots and lots of other factors.
I know.
I actually happened to believe that what we were trying to do from a strategic point of view, trying to lower taxes and trying to make the country more productive and wealth creating, was a good thing.
I know what you both believed, but it turned out you were both wrong.
No, no, no.
The implementation was wrong.
I accept that.
But I think the strategy was the right thing.
But again, I understand you don't want to apologise.
My question is why?
Because I don't think that the strategy was the wrong strategy.
I don't apologise for the strategy.
I just think the implementation and the way in which it was delivered could have been improved massively.
And I've freely accepted that.
You said it was a big mistake.
No, I said, so there are two things.
There's a strategic goal.
I want to have a lower tax Britain.
And there's a way you get there.
Now, the way that the implementation were used, I think, left a lot to be desired.
I think it was the wrong thing at the wrong time.
We went too far.
Yes.
However, the strategy, where we wanted to get to, was absolutely...
Well, I'm sure.
And that's an important thing.
That's an important decision.
That's fine, but the reality of your actions is that millions of people in this country suffered immediate financial harm.
And to those people, I don't want an apology from you, to me, but there are people watching this.
Hang on.
There are people watching this who went through genuine financial harm as a consequence of your actions.
So don't apologise to me.
But for them, I'm very curious why you would be prepared to look down the barrel of the camera on a show like this and not just say, I'm sorry.
What I would do is just say, you know, we could have done things better.
But I'm not going to apologise.
But we're not apologising.
You're sounding.
I'm not apologising for the strategy.
I think it was the right strategy, but the implementation was wrong.
Well, I'm sorry, I said, next, I'm going to keep trying and see if I can finally get an apology from Kwasi Quarte.
Apologise for the shocking implications.
So look, I'm not going to come here.
You always do this.
You get people on and you want them to sort of wear the hair shirt and humiliate them.
But I'm not.
I don't.
I have no wish to humiliate you whatsoever.
Honestly, don't.
I have zero wish to humiliate you.
I actually thought you were going to be a really good chancellor, but what it's worth.
No, thank you.
That's very kind of you.
But I think the pair of you lost your minds.
I think we went too far, too far.
Right.
I accept that.
I think you lost your minds and you got way ahead of yourselves.
But the consequences of your actions led to you being fired.
Liz Truss hoping that would save her skin.
It didn't.
She then had to go to humiliation for the pair of you and for the country on the global stage.
But again, I come back to one thing.
You may not want to apologise.
And I'm not after it.
But I'm not trying to humiliate you.
No, no, no.
You guys, with respect, Quasi, you guys humiliated yourselves.
Well, okay.
Right.
But in the process, you also exposed the country to humiliation.
It was a very damaging period for Britain in terms of our standing around the world.
And more importantly to me, millions of British people already suffering from a pandemic, already suffering a cost of living crisis, already suffering from energy costs going through the roof, all these things, they then had the added financial burden as a consequence of the...
It was a difficult time.
Taking Responsibility Without Apology 00:09:50
So my point is...
So my point is, you're a smart guy.
You know that the decisions that you took led to that financial harm for millions of people in this country.
Why are you not prepared?
So you know what this reminds me of, and you're going to laugh, but it reminds me of Frost trying to get that apology out of Nixon for the damage he'd done to the reputation of America.
Why don't you just take a leaf out of Nixon's book?
He didn't want to apologise either.
He resisted for years.
And then eventually he sat back and you can see his brain whirring, thinking, actually, you know what?
Yes, I'm sorry.
Why is it so hard?
Look, it's not hard.
Please, it's impossible.
You're literally finding it.
But look, there were lots of other people involved in this, okay?
I'm not sure.
You were the chancellor.
I'm not going to take sole responsibility when there were lots of people.
You're not taking any responsibility.
No, I do.
I have taken responsibility.
I'm not going to take sole responsibility.
You don't think what happened raises the bars of a level of wanting to apologise?
What I've said is that I took responsibility and we should have done things in a more measured and a deliberate way.
That would have been.
Have you heard the Elton John song, Sorry, Seems to be the.
You like that song?
It's a very good song.
Do you play it a lot?
I'm not a big fan of Elton John, but I like it.
Do you know that song?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I do.
I do know that song.
Do those words resonate?
No, look, I'm not coming here to relitigate.
You spent 10 minutes not wanting to apologise.
You spent the year not wanting to apologise.
No, and I've said millions of times that you want to be apologized.
And I bear responsibility, that we did things in the wrong way.
But in terms of the strategy, I still believe in the strategy.
So I don't see why I should apologise for the strategy.
Because the implementation was a total dispute.
The implementation was.
So when you implement something as a chancellor of this country that causes huge financial harm immediately to millions of British people, the traditional thing is to say, you know what, I'm sorry for the damage I did.
And if you look at where we are now, obviously, you know, interest rates have more than doubled since.
I'm only talking about the consequences of your actions.
Since I was there.
I think a lot of the time, I think thanks to... Karzi, I'm talking about by your own admission, the consequences of your actions as chancellor and the immediate impact that you're doing.
It was a difficult time.
I'm not going to come on the show.
You were the one that caused it.
No, no, no.
I wasn't the sole.
We've gone through this a million times.
You were the chancellor.
I was not the sole agent of what happened.
What I can't give my head is the sole agent.
Why are you so desperate?
What I'm trying to say.
Why are you so desperate not to apologize?
Because what will happen is if I say, oh, you know, then Gillian's got to say, everyone's got to apologise for it.
Let's remind anybody else.
No, that's important.
And I just think that it's very easy to get politicians who are ultimately responsible for things to try and say, okay, I'm sorry.
When politicians screw up badly and it impacts on millions of people's lives, I think that it is incumbent on them not only to take responsibility, but to apologize.
So I've taken responsibility.
I accept that the implementation was.
Being not sorry.
I still think the strategy was the right thing.
But you're not sorry for the implementation.
And I think we'll come...
Being all sorry for the implementation.
And I think we'll come around to...
Do you not find it a bit ridiculous?
No, I don't.
Look, we're playing a game here.
We're not playing a game.
It's not a game to the millions of people.
It's not a game to the people whose lives were affected.
I was saying that I was completely responsible.
Not completely responsible, but I was involved in those decisions.
Some of those decisions we should have.
There are people watching this now as well.
Honestly, I promise you.
I've interviewed many people over the years.
Thousands.
There will be people watching this now going, why doesn't he just say sorry?
What's the matter with him?
Yeah, I can understand that.
But all I want to say is that I don't apologise for the strategy.
I think it's the right thing.
We've got to have perfectly entitled to.
I think we've got to have a lower tax.
It's more productive.
You can't have wealth created.
And you can't have lower taxation without funding it properly.
Yeah, I agree with that.
And that was what...
You didn't fund it.
If we'd actually talked through, if we'd had time, that was why in the autumn statement I said, look, I'm going to have a statement where we're going to show spending restraint, which will fund the tax cuts.
Unfortunately, and it wasn't a choice of mine, I was obviously sacked because of the turbulence, because of the market reaction.
I was sacked before I was able to do that.
And when Jeremy Hunt...
Did Liz Trust say sorry to you?
No, she hasn't apologised to me.
She's never apologized.
No, she doesn't.
So she screwed you, basically stuck a political knife in your back.
Well, I was sacked, and I think the idea was that she was...
She never apologised?
No, no, no, she hasn't done that, and I haven't insisted upon it.
Do you still talk to her?
Yeah.
I mean, I've spoken to her.
When was the last time?
Well, a few months ago.
So you don't really talk to her?
You don't, do you?
No, a few months ago.
I see her in the House of Commissioners.
She stabbed you in the back and rapped political.
And so once I was sacked, then she took responsibility.
We've got a new chancellor in who's still there.
And a lot of the stuff.
Let me ask you, do you ever apologise for anything?
Yeah, I mean, I apologise in my private life the whole time.
When was the last time you apologised or something?
I think I picked up my daughter from nursery too late and I apologised then of a couple of weeks.
So just to be clear, hang on.
Just to be clear, you're happy to apologise to people at a...
Hang on, at a nursery school for being a few minutes late to pick up your daughter, but you're not prepared to apologise to millions of people for screwing their personal finances.
That's where I look at it.
I know where you're coming from.
And you think I'm trying to humiliate you?
I'm not.
I'm just thinking from a public, in terms of public affairs and public life, I think politicians make decisions on the basis of evidence, on the basis of their own philosophy, if you like.
And I've never been one for saying, you know, as a politician, you know, you're personally damaging people.
There's policy, there's debate.
You did personally.
Well, no, because there were lots of other things.
I did not personally damage those people.
But you've omitted the implementation of the story.
I think it was strategy.
And there was a lot of context.
It was so bad.
And that managed me.
There was a lot of context as well.
You said, well, forget about the context.
Well, no, the context is important.
I know the context.
I saw the reaction to your policy.
And I think that, yeah, and there were lots of things going on.
There was also the time where I came back from Washington and was sacked.
And, you know, I haven't asked for an apology for that.
That's the way public affairs these days is conducted.
And people have sincere beliefs and they want to do the best for their country.
Final question.
And they shouldn't apologise for that.
Well, actually, I think...
I mean, you and I have a different view, maybe.
I think you'll find it's my view is the common view.
Okay.
I honestly do.
And honestly, I did not get you here.
I actually thought you know over time, after a year, you go, actually, yes, I'm sorry.
It's simply as simple as that.
Okay.
And then you put up with one day's headlines, a quasi-quad saying, I'm sorry that we got it wrong and I've damaged people's lives.
So I think why.
You said what you've got is a 15-minute attempt by me to in your eyes, wrestle some kind of fake apology out of you.
In my eyes, get an apology for the people whose lives you've faked.
I think the strategy, and I think in the long term, we have to have a lower tax.
But that's different.
And I don't think it is different.
I'm not going to apologise for what the goal was.
That's what I believe.
You're perfectly entitled.
Honestly, I mean this, you're entitled to believe that your philosophy and your strategy would have worked over time.
But I'm also entitled to go back at you and say, the implementation was reckless, it was wrong, it tanked the markets, it spooked everybody in the world of economics.
And the consequence of that was you got fired very quickly and the prime minister lasted 44 days and the whole thing brought shame on this country.
But more importantly, millions of people in this country suffered personal financial loss as a consequence of what you guys did.
And I just find it baffling, honestly, and I'm not trying to humiliate you.
No, no, I get that.
Because I actually, I've always liked you as a politician.
And I did think you were going to be a good Chancellor.
And I'm sorry it didn't work out for you.
But I'm actually sorrier for the people who lost money.
And I think they'll be watching this going, why doesn't he just say sorry?
I understand where you're coming from.
Last chance.
Look, I just think it was a difficult time.
Last chance.
But I still believe the strategy was the right thing.
But you know the implementation was a fiasco.
And the implementation could have been better.
You're sorry for that.
I also think we should have had it.
Are you sorry for that?
We should have had more time.
There you go.
I'm sorry for the implementation.
The strategy was the right.
And you're sorry for the damage the implementation.
So there you go.
You know, we've had this discussion.
I think you're right to say, on consideration, I think you're right to say people should put their hand up.
And also, having put their hand up, they should be able to show some contrition.
You are sorry.
I'm happy to show that.
What I'm not happy to say, and what I stick to, is the fact that as far as this country is concerned and its wealth and its prospects, we cannot tax ourselves to prosperity.
But that's a different argument.
And you're perfectly surprised.
No, but I've made that argument for the last few months.
But am I right in thinking you now for the damage that the implementation caused to millions of people, you're sorry.
I show abject contrition.
I'm very.
Are you sorry?
Look, look, whatever formula of words.
I'm just asking, are you sorry?
I'm sorry for the turbulence that was causing it.
You're sorry for the damage it caused to British people.
If that's what you want me to say, it's what I want you to want to say.
Look, what I want to say is that I think the strategy was right.
I'm sorry for the implementation.
Are you sorry for the damage caused to the British people?
I'm sorry for the implementation and it was too far to.
And for the damage caused to the British government.
I don't know why you...
Look, there were lots of people.
Because they suffered financial loss.
Lots of people were.
No, but you were the Chancellor.
Okay.
I was the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Are you sorry for the financial damage it caused to the British government?
I'm sorry for the damage and the loss.
And it was a scary time.
And I'm sorry for that.
Quasi, we got there.
Okay.
And I've not tried to drag that out of you.
No, no, I've not tried to humiliate you.
We've had a good conversation.
And I think you've come to it.
I thought about what you were saying and I thought, actually, you know, we've got to pick your hand up.
I've accepted responsibility a long time ago.
And you've said, well, why don't you do the step forward, take a step further and apologise?
And I've said, you know, that's fair enough.
Losing A Brother In War 00:12:51
And now you have.
Yeah.
Do you feel better now?
Not particularly.
I don't feel better or worse.
I feel...
I'm glad you have.
Well, I'm glad that you're happy, but I do.
I'm not happy.
I'm just glad that you have not only recognised accountability and responsibility, but you've also apologised now to the people who saw you.
I've totally recognized it.
I think that is the right...
And a year on, we've had an interesting debate, and I'm looking at splitting hairs between responsibility and apologies and all the rest of it.
And I think broadly, you know, people were adversely affected.
It is a scary time, particularly with mortgages, which are still going up in many instances.
And I think on your principle, I think politicians should put their hands up and say they're sorry.
Thank you, Kwasikwati.
Good to see you.
Uncensored next.
An exclusive interview.
I'll be joined by the family of a 22-year-old British student who last week was killed in a Russian mortar strike while fighting for Ukraine.
Welcome back to Piers Morgan Uncensored.
A British soldier who volunteered to fight for Ukraine was killed in battle last week, becoming the 10th Brit to die fighting in the war against Russia.
Friends of family of Samuel Newey have said he had a kind and giving heart and always wanted to help people.
Samuel was just 22 and was studying psychology at university.
His mother said he didn't even think twice when making the decision to fly to the warntall country to support the Ukrainian forces.
And I'm joined now by Samuel's mother, Vicky Downs, and his brother, Daniel New.
He's also been fighting with the Ukrainian forces.
Thank you both for coming all the way in today.
You're welcome.
My deepest condolences to you as his mum, to you as his brother.
Thank you.
My brother was a serving officer in various wars.
We know as a family, we know what you've been through to a degree, but we never had to go through what you both go through now.
Let me first of all ask you, how are you doing?
How would any mother do?
I am broken, but immensely, immensely proud of the man he grew into, the sacrifice that he made as a mum.
Would I change it?
Absolutely, in a heartbeat.
Right.
How do you feel about it?
You've been out in Ukraine fighting as well.
You're actually his commander for a few months with the Ukrainian forces.
How are you feeling right now?
From a human perspective, obviously it's not a good thing to lose your brother.
So that's something that's going to be with me for the rest of my life.
But on the other hand, the progress that he made during his time in Ukraine, it was absolutely crazy to see him change from a boy into a man.
So from a soldier perspective, I'm so proud of him.
What compelled you both to want to be there?
I think it's more of a question of morality.
So the way that we were always brought up is if you see something wrong, speak out against it, act out against it.
So I think it's just part of our nature to just help wherever people need help.
Do you know what happened to Sam?
I do.
I do know what happened.
Would it be all right not to go into details?
But what I do know is that Sam was first in And he was last out, and he would not leave his position until all of his unit were out.
And pretty much, that's all I know, really.
Just what do you feel about the cause that he was fighting for?
What do I feel about the cause?
It's a from a humanitarian point of view, I agree.
I agree with the cause.
I think that it is important as human beings to challenge wrongdoing where we can.
You know, we're lucky in this country that we have a voice.
We are allowed to speak out.
We are not oppressed to a certain degree.
We have to, we have to stick up.
We have to fight for the rights of other people when we see that they're not being given the same rights and democracy that we have.
What are your feelings about Vladimir Putin?
I feel really sorry for Putin.
I think he's delusional.
I think that he has had a life unlike ours.
I think that their society is very different.
I don't hate him.
I just feel sorry for him.
It takes a lot to not hate someone who's been responsible for your boy's death.
It does take a lot.
But the whole reason, both my sons do what they do for good reasons.
And if I hated, where would that hate start?
Where would it end?
How do you feel about Putin and what the Russians are doing?
The same.
Obviously, I don't agree with the invasion of Ukraine.
It's an illegal invasion, and it could be argued that it is actively a genocide.
I've got no animosity towards Russians.
During my time in Ukraine, when we take prisoners, a lot of these people are just young kids that have been forced into a situation, so they haven't really got the choice, if that makes sense.
So I hold no hatred towards Russians or to Russia as a country.
But yeah, obviously, the situation just is what it is.
I don't know.
I mean, it could be argued that this is an overspill of the proxy conflict in Syria.
I mean, if we look at sort of the Russian and American proxy war that happened there, this is a direct overspill.
So what we're seeing is obviously Assad's been sort of propped up by the Russian regime.
And then we see, obviously, Russia trying to drive a wedge in NATO as well.
So if we look at Erdogan's relationship with Putin, it's very obvious and it should be obvious to everybody that these countries like Russia, Turkey, they are the enemy of all democracy-loving countries and people.
So again, I mean, this is we shouldn't look at these as isolated incidents.
They are all completely interconnected.
So I think that's what people should take on board.
Will you go back to Ukraine?
I don't want to say this in front of my mum, but 1 million percent I'm going to go back.
How do you feel about that?
I have to support my child in whatever decision he makes.
What I feel about it as a mother, I don't think any words can describe how much I would want to say don't go, don't go, but I don't think I'd be able to stop him even if I wanted to.
So he will go with love and support.
Has Sam been brought home yet?
Not yet.
We're trying to get him home and we will get him home.
It's a really strange conversation that two brothers have had, I suppose.
But Sam wanted to be buried at a huge cost, didn't want to be cremated.
So we are currently raising money to get him home and to give him a funeral.
We would like military honours, but we're struggling to organise everything.
But we'll do what we can.
Whatever's left, we intend.
You know, there are nine other families in this country who are going through what we go through, what we're going through.
But there are also families from other conflicts whose children have volunteered to go out there and fight.
You know, we need to support.
What is the legality of what you guys have been doing?
It's quite a grey area.
So with Ukraine at the moment, because obviously there's quite a lot of support from Western countries, it's not a problem.
So when you're making a decision to travel out, the police stop you, they give you a little letter that says, look, you're probably going to get hurt.
We've told you not to go.
Don't go.
It's up to you.
It's like a disclaimer.
Yeah, yeah, for sure.
It just covers their backside.
But if we look at, say, like Syria, when volunteers initially started going to Syria, a lot of people were being arrested for terrorism offences and stuff.
So I think it just depends on the political situation and depending on who it is that you're actually fighting against.
So obviously Turkey being a NATO country, for me, that was a big problem when I decided to participate in the conflict against Turkey.
But yeah, Russia being the enemy of the West, it's not a problem at all.
This issue of when your brother comes back, getting military honours, recognition for his extraordinary courage that he's shown.
He's not a regular member of the armed forces.
Presumably, there'll be a process, I guess, which says, well, it doesn't count, but obviously it should count.
Is that how you feel?
Definitely.
At the end of the day, my brother's put his life on the line and travelled to another country to help people that need him.
I think millennials and Gen Z get quite a hard reputation a lot of the time.
A lot of people say that it's not within us to sacrifice it and to know what struggle is, but I'd like to argue the opposite.
We do know what struggle is.
A lot of us do give up comfortable lives to travel to other places to help people.
So that's the bottom line.
And I don't think people should ever negate the sacrifices that have been made.
So my brother was 22 when he died.
He's given up his whole life for other people.
He's not going to have any more days.
And to be able to square that away with yourself as a human and say, right, I'm willing to give up all the rest of my days for other people.
It just takes a different way.
Well, to fight for freedom and democracy, which I think is the most important thing you could ever fight for.
Absolutely.
And your son, to me, is a hero and should be treated as such by this country.
He may not have been there officially, but he was there risking his life, as it turned out, losing his life to fight for Ukraine's freedom and democracy.
And I can only imagine how grateful the Ukrainian people must feel about what both your boys have done for their country.
Just before I let you go, just tell me about your son, Sam.
What kind of absolute nightmare?
He was an absolute nightmare.
So Sam was born with unnatural confidence as a toddler.
It was in him to fight for what he believed.
Even as a child, if you chastised him, he would argue his points.
And he was so funny, so funny, got a great sense of humour, intelligent.
He actually did, he won Apprentice of the Year in Butchery.
And he was presented with a certificate by Princess Anne with all people.
And God love him.
He chatted to her for an hour like she was an old school friend.
I don't know what she made of him, but if you had met him, he'd have left a mark.
It's obviously desperately sad that you lost your son.
Honoring A Son Who Fought Freedom 00:07:19
He sounds a remarkable young man in many different ways.
But how proud of him are you?
Immensely.
Immensely proud.
There are no, I'm heartbroken, but my gosh, what a man he grew into.
A lot of people have said, gosh, you're a great mum, you've brought them up well.
And Piers, I won't take that.
You don't give somebody morality.
You don't give them bravery and courage and honour.
It's in there.
That's down to Sam.
That's not down to me.
I'm so sorry that you've lost this wonderful son, that we've lost what sounds like a great Britain.
Absolutely.
And I'm very grateful to you for what you've been doing.
I wish you all the very best if you do go back there.
Thank you for that.
Ukrainian people need all the help they can get.
Definitely.
And I feel that there's nothing more important than what they're fighting for.
Definitely.
So thank you both for coming in.
I wish it was under different circumstances, but Sam was a hero and you should both know that.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Well, uncensored next.
Is Macbeth racist and full of references that reinforce white supremacy?
That's a claim of a US academic.
My PAC will be here to debate that and the very moving interview that we've just conducted.
Welcome back to Piers Morgan Census.
I'm joined now by my Stella Pack, talk-to-be contributor Paul LaRone Adrian, the political sketchwriter.
It's a Daily Mail again.
Quentin Lex and political journalist Ava Santis.
Welcome to all of you.
Have you missed Stella?
Point of Stella.
I know you haven't missed me, but have you two missed me?
Of course, dreadfully.
Look at the terrible disingenuous expressions.
I'm temporarily healthy.
It won't last long.
Just want to talk to you straight away just about that interview I just conducted with that poor woman whose son, 22 years old, gone to fight for the Ukrainian forces, as she put it for freedom and democracy, with her other son, who's also done that, sitting there saying he's going to probably go back.
And yet there's no formal way of bringing her son home.
There's no help from the government, the Foreign Office.
They are struggling to find money for the burial.
This doesn't seem right to me.
It isn't right.
And I have to be careful because obviously I'm a barrister and I expect everyone to abide by the rules and laws that our state sets us.
And technically, of course, we know that he shouldn't have been there.
But what does surprise me is that our Foreign Office doesn't have just an ounce of sensitivity to offer support to the family because it is the family.
It is the loved ones who are struggling and have to deal with not only the loss, but of dealing with all the bureaucracy and rhythmorall that goes with bringing a lost member back to his country.
Quentin, it just doesn't...
It's a personal misfortune.
It's a very terrible personal misfortune and a tragedy and one feels sympathy.
But it's not yet a national war that we're in.
And therefore, people who go out there and fight Europeans who aren't part of the Ukrainian nation, then they're doing it at their own personal risk.
They are.
And I don't think they were contesting that part of it.
Well, therefore, if you start then bringing them back and giving them military honours, that first of all politicises it in a very dangerous way.
But it also, I think, dilutes the gravity of a nation declaring war.
I mean, it's complicated this, Ava.
I felt incredibly sorry for them.
I come from a family full of military people who served in war.
And thank God we never had the call that she had to take that her boy had died.
He wasn't there officially in the British Armed Forces because we're not there officially for that.
But he did serve incredibly bravely for the Ukrainian forces, forces that we are supporting with other military means in terms of equipment.
But defensive, right?
So if we start, I mean, if you start honouring British fighters who've gone over there to contribute, then you've de facto got boots on the ground, haven't you?
You've sort of put the British army.
Or is there a distinction to be made that it wasn't official?
We can still recognise that somebody has lost their life fighting for freedom and democracy.
I think this is really tricky because I don't want to sound like the evil witch in the corner.
But I mean, you shouldn't have been there and you've been told not to go there.
It's extremely valiant he did.
And I really feel for his mother.
I can't imagine what she's going through.
She was a very impressive lady.
I'm going to start dishing out honours to people who've, you know, travel over to Ukraine.
I mean, that just sounds like quite dangerous, actually.
It's complicated.
It'd be interesting to see what help we can get them.
Let's turn to the other big interview that we did, which Kwasi Kwarteng.
So quite extraordinary.
I do a whole monologue about the inability of public figures to say sorry when they genuinely get things horribly wrong that have consequences for a lot of people.
Kwasi Kwarteng spectacularly got things wrong as Chancellor, which directly impacted on the finances of millions of British people and still continues to.
And yet, Quentin, for 20 minutes, having listened to the monologue, he still refused to say sorry.
He wouldn't say the words.
And eventually he did.
Eventually, it was almost like the lights came on and he realised how bad it was looking that he wasn't prepared to say that for the damage he caused millions of people directly financially with his policy, which went spectacularly wrong, he was sorry.
Why is it so hard for them?
Should they apologise, first of all?
Well, I'm not quite as obsessed about apologies as some are.
But I think politicians become hard-boiled against the idea of apologies.
I mean, I refused to apologise when I left Good Morning Britain.
That's why I had to leave.
But that wasn't because I directly impacted that there was a principle there.
Yeah, but he accepted that whilst he still believed in the general strategy, the implementation had been terrible, right?
So he accepted that.
I see what you're saying.
But the politicians become hard-boiled against somehow ceding ground to apologies because politics is about the battle of ideas and they want to defend those ideas.
But when something goes very badly wrong in a big way, then obviously it's a good idea to say we got one wrong.
Yeah, I mean, Ava, you could argue this is one of the most catastrophic performances by any Chancellor in British history.
I mean, he lasted just days as Chancellor.
The prime minister who helped him enact this lasted 44 days, the worst prime minister ever in terms of tenure.
So why not just throw your hands up and actually just throw yourself at the mercy of the British people who are very forgiving, actually, in my experience.
And just say, we made a big mistake and we're sorry.
Well, he can't be that sorry because he still took the £16,000 severance that's offered to cabinet ministers when they depart, right?
So if he really was sorry, maybe he'd give that money over.
It's probably about the amount that a lot of mortgage owners have lost off their mortgages or had wiped off because of him.
I have to say, it took you 20 minutes to get that apology out of him.
I'm not sure whether the people who are struggling to feed their children will accept that apology or think that that apology came from somewhere that was real.
Yeah, I mean, it's a fair point given how long it took him.
Is Shakespeare Really Racist 00:02:55
Macbeth, Quentin.
Yes.
Is Macbeth racist?
So we have an American, there are always American academics, assistant professor of English at Trinity University in Texas, says that the bard's use of words such as bat, beetle, black, and night are racialized language.
And harder to scene where a current uses the phrase black Macbeth.
She says it's important to help students see the ways which a play may not recognise immediately as a race play based on radicalized language and playing on the dichotomy of whiteness and blackness and dark and light.
The great thing about Shakespeare is that you can put all sorts of teenage literary criticism interpretations on it.
And I think that's about the level of this.
Paula, I mean, you often defend the indefensible on these sort of stories, but come on.
Macbeth racist for radicalized language.
So I think old Shakespeare sitting there as a little covert racist.
So I can't answer that question, but what I can do.
Yes, you can.
What I can, no, I can't, because I don't know that.
You can't defend it.
And what I can say is that clearly there was racist language used.
What I can say is clearly at that time they would have been racist people.
What I can say is that does it make it wrong for this academic and scholar to put forward those theories and for those theories to be tested?
I just think that's what I'm saying.
Let me go over on this because I think what's happening is there are academics all over the world who know they can get ridiculous clickbaiting publicity by calling literally everything racist.
And when they're not calling it racist, they're calling everything transphobic.
And when they're not calling things transphobic, they're calling everything sexist.
When they're not banging out about sexism, they're banging about the patriarchy.
That all leads to Barbie, which is the ultimate, ultimate example of what I'm talking about.
Not everything has to be all these things.
I actually thought it was really interesting.
I'd never ever thought about it in this light before.
Oh, now you think Macbeth is racist.
I don't think...
Let me let me hang on a second.
Okay, I was thinking that perhaps, well, yes, the slave trade had really kicked off then.
And Shakespeare was at the time writing for Queen Elizabeth.
And she was infamously kicking out quite a lot of the black community from London at that time.
She was, you know, throwing Spaniards out and throwing people back to Morocco.
So perhaps there could be an element of Shakespeare's writing that was appealing to that side of Queen Elizabeth who liked to paint herself white with lead and was quite obsessed with colour.
Well, perhaps Shakespeare wasn't racist.
I'm not saying perhaps he just was one of the greatest people this country has ever consumed.
Isn't that the best?
And was a brilliant playwright and didn't actually have a racist bone in his body.
What about that old quaint theory?
How do you know that?
How do you know he wasn't?
I don't, but what I'm saying is it's important for us to debate that.
It's important for us to discuss it.
And well done to the academic scholar for at least putting forward her theories.
He was just a bit bigger than this.
He was so much bigger.
Anyway.
Or he didn't write it at all.
It's a good theory, isn't it?
Unfortunately, this show has suddenly got so much smaller because it's over.
But thank you to my brilliant pack, as always.
As it from me, whatever you're up to, keep it uncensored.
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