Lord Mandelson failed security vetting but who knew what, when? — BBC Newscast

[0:00] Hello it's Adam in the newscast studio and it is Chris at Westminster and in the second half of [0:04] this episode we will talk about the many many developments happening in the world for example [0:08] the ceasefire that's just been announced as we're recording this episode between Israel and Lebanon [0:13] which has been announced by Donald Trump but first of all that big breaking story that Chris has been [0:17] working on in Westminster Thursday afternoon and Thursday evening Chris it's the return of the [0:22] Lord Mandelson ex-ambassador to Washington story and who knew what when about his appointment [0:29] bring us up to date exactly that so let me walk you through what happened this afternoon and then [0:35] into this evening so just after three o'clock this afternoon the Guardian Pippa Carrera their [0:41] political editor and their investigations team dropped a couple of stories relating to Lord [0:47] Mandelson and the whole business of his appointment as ambassador to Washington you'll remember that in [0:53] the end he was sacked and it's caused the Prime Minister no end of grief so in those stories [0:58] around about three o'clock the Guardian said that Lord Mandelson had failed a key element of the [1:06] vetting process that was undertaken around his appointment but the Foreign Office decided that [1:13] it was going to if you like reject that advice and the government was going to crack on with the [1:19] process of appointing him anyway and of course Lord Mandelson then did go out to Washington and do the job [1:24] for a while so we then had a period of the best part of three hours in which opposition parties [1:31] conservatives reform liberal democrats and others were coming out and saying ah the Prime Minister has [1:37] misled us including misleading the House of Commons and if you do that and do that on purpose that is seen [1:44] as a resignation issue because there's various clips floating around you may have seen them on social [1:49] media or elsewhere of the Prime Minister talking about the vetting process and so I assembled a [1:55] piece for the six o'clock news on the telly and I had a sneaking suspicion nobody had told me this but [2:00] this is a sneaking suspicion that before six o'clock and probably just before six o'clock Downing Street [2:08] or government might get round to saying something that might change the terms of this story and sure [2:13] enough they did in the time it took me to walk from our newsroom to our balcony where I report [2:19] live for the six o'clock news a text appears in my whatsapps and sure enough the government is saying [2:26] neither the Prime Minister nor any government minister was aware that Peter Mandelson was granted [2:31] developed vetting against the advice of UK security vetting until earlier this week in other words [2:39] he didn't know which then of course poses the rather significant question of why did he not know [2:46] why was he insufficiently curious to find out about what the vetting process around a appointment of a [2:53] colourful and controversial character might have concluded. Although I suppose that statement sort of [2:59] protects the Prime Minister from his point of view about the allegations that he misled Parliament. [3:03] Completely, absolutely. Because he didn't know. Because he says and they've said it explicitly and [3:08] on the record and categorically that the Prime Minister didn't know. So yes the criticism is [3:14] already coming along the lines of well why didn't you know and why were you not more curious but if [3:19] you like I suppose that is a second order critique relative to one where they were not able to say [3:26] that statement because it wasn't true where politicians would say well hang on a minute [3:31] you have misled us and knowingly misled us whereas given what he is saying he can say [3:38] well actually I didn't know. I suspect we'll have him in the House of Commons on Monday formally updating [3:44] the House and acknowledging that you know he wasn't able to share the full facts because he wasn't in [3:50] possession of the full facts at the time. And we already know from all those emails and documents that [3:55] have been released as a result of the Conservative motion in Parliament a few months ago about the [4:01] Mandelson appointment that actually one of the big themes of those documents was the PM not really [4:06] being very involved after the point at which he said let's get this guy in to be our new man in [4:11] Washington. Quite and I think in many senses it would appear that this is a further case study or [4:17] further evidence that uh burnishes that uh that wider argument that the Prime Minister was [4:23] insufficiently involved that it was outsourced to others and then the whole thing of course uh very [4:30] much blew up in his face. You know this has been the politically most consequential decision of Keir [4:35] Starmer's time uh in Downing Street. It was a appointment of choice normally a senior ambassadorial [4:43] appointment let alone the the most prominent of them all ambassador in Washington is a career civil [4:49] servant. They have political if you like detachment and distance from any Prime Minister. They're [4:55] probably more like less likely to be caught up in some swirling political row and instead the decision [5:01] was taken to appoint Peter Mandelson who had you know left various government jobs in the past with all [5:08] sorts of clouds uh hovering uh hovering over him was seen to be one heck of a political operator but [5:14] also seen to come with a fair amount of uh baggage uh out he goes and then the whole thing blows up [5:20] and it blows up spectacularly in the Prime Minister's face and of course we know that this isn't the end [5:26] of it because we are waiting the next is it tranche or is it tranche of uh documents to come from this [5:33] process that Parliament has demanded of the government to publish loads of stuff uh connected [5:38] to uh the appointment of Lord Mandelson. We were waiting for that already and we've just had another [5:45] another chapter of it and just one extra detail which newscasters will be keen to hear [5:49] which is the Guardian reported uh that and I think this is key the Guardian reported that there was a [5:56] conversation going on in government as to whether or not they would have to disclose [6:02] this failure in vetting to Parliament as a result of a disclosure of all of these uh documents now uh [6:11] it seems to me that is quite key um in what might have brought this to light at this point I have no [6:17] idea who the Guardian sources are and of course the Guardian will be scrupulous in protecting their [6:20] sources absolutely rightly as any journalist should be uh but it um that seems key I would have thought [6:27] to what could I'm speculating but what could have motivated some to decide that this ought to see [6:34] the light of day but then in turn and so just to be clear Downing Street have said the first that the [6:39] Prime Minister knew about this failed vetting was this week yes so in the last few days completely that [6:47] so earlier this week is the is the quote so I guess that's presumably you know without those words doing a [6:55] lot of work any day this week prior to today um now whether that coincided thank you for explaining [7:04] we have to use the language to work out when they knew don't we completely completely yes [7:10] because if he learned yesterday they would have said he only learned yesterday well possibly yeah [7:16] possibly or you go for a slightly vaguer formulation or earlier this week it would be a struggle I think [7:21] to imply earlier this week if it was earlier today even though technically that was earlier this week [7:26] um you know was that uh and again I'm speculating now but was that when the Guardian approached them [7:33] and said this is a story we're intending to run and do you want to say anything about it or was it as [7:37] a result of something else we don't know but in in essence they're saying um look uh you know we only [7:43] found out this week uh separately from that I hear that uh David Lammy the deputy prime minister and [7:50] former foreign secretary um uh only found out about this today now you know the statement said no [7:57] government minister but that's being made clear I also understand that Lord Mandelson himself did not [8:04] know any of this until today he'd gone through the vetting process there were no further questions or [8:11] follow-ups and then he was appointed and all the and all the uh rest of it so plenty of those who [8:18] you might have assumed would have known about what we have discovered today courtesy of the [8:24] Guardian's reporting are saying that they didn't know there's others who are yet to reply to us but [8:30] that's kind of where we are as we uh record this edition of newscasts so if no ministers knew [8:35] including up to the prime minister and including the foreign secretary at the time David Lammy [8:39] who do we think did know well we don't know is the is the is the honest answer I mean it seems to me [8:46] that um now clearly some folk in the foreign office knew and you would assume that senior folk in and [8:55] around the upper echelons of government would have known but as I say we don't we don't know so who knew [9:02] what and when and why did they choose not to tell others is a very live and relevant question but we [9:10] don't know the answers to those questions and Chris before you came into the newscast satellite studio [9:15] at Westminster I hear you were interviewing Emily Thornberry Dame Emily Thornberry Chair of the [9:20] Foreign Affairs Select Committee Labour MP she does a good line in exasperation but she's turned the [9:26] exasperation up to about 15 are here in this interview she does do a good line in exasperation [9:31] and she was absolutely um exasperated she had with her a letter which is out there it's in in public [9:40] uh between the committee and the foreign office where they asked lots of questions around the whole [9:46] process of Peter Maddelson's appointment but they also asked specific questions like were there any [9:51] concerns raised and this is not a verbatim quote but the essence of it were any concerns raised in [9:56] the vetting process and they got kind of non answers um she was uh saying to me but let's hear her [10:04] newscasters can hear the exasperation for themselves we're so fed up we had the people in front of us we [10:11] asked them questions and we just i mean they've just been taking the mickey out of us you know they asked [10:16] us they they they we gave them direct questions and they half answered it but they missed out the [10:22] bit that was important so they said oh yes there was direct vetting and at the end of it he was [10:27] appointed they missed out the bit saying he didn't pass the vetting they missed that bit out i mean being [10:35] at our most generous you know it wasn't a full answer there is a question about whether it was [10:41] misleading and was it deliberately misleading i mean it's appalling and i suppose chris apart from that [10:47] clip being quite entertaining to hear emily thornbury's eye roll um is that it it keeps the [10:53] focus on what happened in the foreign office at official level yeah completely i mean she said to [10:59] me just after we finished um in a colorful turn of phrase that it would be a bit like you arriving at [11:05] work in the morning uh saying to your colleagues because you're a bit sweaty that you've run all the [11:10] way from home but failing to tell them it was because you were being chased by a bear [11:14] uh in other words that sort of sense that there was some sharp questions and direct questions asked [11:20] by the committee and the uh answers completely ducked what the wider machine at the very least [11:29] knew uh to be uh knew to be the case when i was listening to radio four on wednesday afternoon [11:36] and you were being interviewed by evan davis who introduced you as the bbc's legendary political [11:41] editor by the way i don't know if you heard that but i i i blushed and then you gave an amazing quote [11:46] you just received from a minister about the government taking ages to do things i think [11:51] that deserves an even wider audience because it's such a good quote oh so i uh yes so i was telling a [11:56] story adam about a conversation i'd had with a minister about their frustrations at getting stuff [12:03] done and the kind of gummed up nature of the governing system if you like and this person said to me [12:09] that they feared that if they keeled over at work what would then happen would be a consultation [12:16] process which would last for 12 weeks there would then be 17 people involved in signing off what to [12:23] do next including the permanent secretary the most senior figure in the department at that point it [12:28] would be authorized that an ambulance could be called and by then the minister would be stone dead [12:34] uh that was the colorful description exasperated uh description around yeah some of the processes [12:42] of getting things done in a complex and advanced western democracy well chris mason quote getting [12:49] machined thank you very much ta-ra so that's the situation at westminster at 8 pm as we finish [12:55] recording this bit of newscast here's how we do a bit of podcasting time jumping because before i spoke to [13:01] chris i got the situation in the rest of the world from two very good friends of the newscast podcast [13:07] and we sat down together just after seven o'clock just after donald trump had been standing outside [13:12] the white house announcing to the world that he had negotiated a ceasefire between israel and lebanon [13:19] of course there was a lot more to it than that as i discussed with two friends of newscast [13:23] and we're now recording this half of this episode of newscast about 10 past seven on thursday night and [13:29] here with me in the studio is jane corbyn from panorama hello jane hello adam and chief north [13:34] america correspondent gary o'donohue not on a screen outside the white house but here in person welcome [13:39] and it's lovely to be here and just as we're recording i noticed you were listening to donald [13:43] trump making some remarks again well yeah when is he ever not but he was responding to the breaking [13:49] news on thursday afternoon thursday evening that there is going to be a ceasefire between israel and [13:54] lebanon what was trump saying and how does this fit into his well i was going to say his grand [13:58] plan but that's well actually i think this has been a real problem so this is a serious development [14:04] for him because uh it was a central part of what iran wanted out of the negotiations uh there was a [14:10] disagreement misunderstanding whatever you want to call it about whether it was part of the the iran [14:15] ceasefire and so to get this i think has removed one of those big stumbling blocks to any kind of [14:20] future negotiations in the next few days between the us and iran so i think it's incredibly important i [14:25] will say of course that you know israel isn't fighting lebanon per se it's fighting hezbollah [14:30] and israel has just said in the last few minutes that it plans to stay inside south lebanon it's like [14:35] it's like 10k inside isn't it so you know that that's not going to change so we'll sit we'll see [14:41] what the what the reality of that ceasefire is on the ground but he's also invited uh the lebanese [14:46] president and uh netanyahu to the white house uh which would be pretty historic i think and and jane how [14:51] does this just fit into the bigger picture of kind of all the fires that trump is fighting at the [14:55] moment you mean in terms of iran yeah well that's the big fire isn't it and we've had this negotiation [15:00] that went on in pakistan which seemed to break up but i never thought it had i mean it just they spent [15:06] 20 odd hours and it was obvious that it was going to continue behind the scenes and that's actually [15:11] what's been happening the ceasefire is still in place there's still discussions and there's optimism [15:16] i think that jd vance again will become involved with the iranians at a high level and those talks [15:22] will resume and as gary said in order to to get that ceasefire to extend and to talk about the [15:29] the nitty-gritty issues like the the nuclear issue and the straits of hormuz they had to sort out this [15:35] continuing exchange of rocket and drone fire between hezbollah and israel so it looks as if that's [15:41] happened with a 10-day ceasefire and it looks as if hezbollah is going to abide by it i mean they've [15:46] actually been hammered very very hard in the last day or so in one of their strongholds in southern [15:51] lebanon by israel in bint jabil and and the last remaining bridge that connects north and south [15:58] lebanon has been destroyed so they're really in a tight corner but it remains to be seen whether they [16:04] will agree to this in the long term if israel as they've said tonight is not prepared to withdraw out [16:10] of lebanon but to retain this 10 kilometer security zone which is effectively a buffer zone for israel [16:17] i mean the pakistanis have also been working incredibly hard on getting another round of [16:22] these negotiations that not just the the the army chief in you know touring going to terran but [16:29] like the prime minister's going through a whole bunch of countries in the middle east at the moment [16:34] they are putting in some serious effort to try and make this happen [16:37] uh and uh you know i think a lot of people are pretty glad that they're they're being able to [16:42] be some sort of you know uh negotiator in the middle of this and uh a lot of people are putting [16:47] a lot of hopes on their efforts i've just realized i've done the thing that quite often happens in [16:51] these situations where that lebanon sort of treated a bit like a subplot whereas for the people who live [16:56] in lebanon it's not a subplot at all it's another chapter in well grim chapter after a lot of other grim [17:03] chapters and more than 2 000 people dead in this the latest round of fighting as you said there's [17:09] always you know poor lebanon's always stuck in the middle bbc verify is reporting that at least 1400 [17:16] buildings have been destroyed in the in southern lebanon you know this is effectively a wasteland [17:21] and lebanon is once again in the crosshairs it's not a subplot it's very very important for the people [17:27] of lebanon and very important i think for the president himself because trump had hoped to get [17:33] them to get netanyahu and our own the president of lebanon to have a direct phone call that didn't [17:39] happen and instead trump had to take the stage and probably was pleased to take the stage and [17:45] announce this ceasefire but you know it's a big thing for lebanon it's technically still a criminal [17:50] act for lebanese to be in touch with an israeli there are no relations between them no diplomatic [17:56] relations and it's 34 years since there was last a meeting at that level and we know that trump did [18:02] manage to bring together the lebanese ambassador in washington and the israeli ambassador in [18:07] washington for these talks that have led now to this ceasefire but leban's really on a knife edge here [18:13] because they've got to handle hezbollah and what that means at the end of the day as far as president [18:18] trump is concerned and israel is concerned but not iran is to disarm hezbollah and that really is a [18:25] very big task and that will be the the sticking point on that particular track of the negotiations [18:32] and also jane i think it's worth reminding newscasters uh about the size of and the [18:36] significance of hezbollah in southern lebanon like we're not just talking about a small armed group here [18:43] it's much more significant i mean thousands and thousands of fighters israel claims to have killed [18:48] 1700 or so in this particular round of fighting and of course the population of lebanon uh 30 of [18:56] lebanon roughly is shia and when the recent polls have been done and asking people within uh the [19:02] shia population because hezbollah is a shia militia if they support them or not you know they're still [19:08] their support is still running high at about between 80 and 90 of the shia population which is a third of [19:14] the lebanese population support hezbollah so that's why it's very difficult for the lebanese president [19:21] he happens to be a christian to try to sort of make this happen when quite a substantial part of [19:28] his own population is pro hezbollah though it also has to be said that the lebanese overall are pretty [19:33] fed up this time they feel that it was hezbollah that fired rockets and drones at israel on march the [19:39] second israel responded they feel that hezbollah has pulled them into this very damaging and [19:47] destructive and terribly devastating phase of fighting with 2 000 people dead at the end of it [19:54] and then gary zooming out to the conflict and the gulf and the middle east more widely um donald trump [20:00] clearly doing a little mini victory lap tonight on thursday night with this this ceasefire for lebanon [20:05] number 10 he's by the way well yes because it's another conflict he has ended even though [20:09] some people say he's quite instrumental in keeping this one going get it done he wants this to be [20:13] seen as his tenth victory and rather than his ninth which it was up till now he's saying get it done get [20:18] it done i mean do the white house feel like the war is going their way i mean i think it's they are [20:27] facing some significant opposition at home from parts of their support that was otherwise loyal and [20:33] that that's not entirely surprising because you know a lot of his supporters thought that america first [20:38] uh meant you know a return to kind of traditional isolationism and there's been some very vocal [20:45] people who are not happy about that having said that i mean i was in alabama the other day talking to [20:51] to you know traditional mega supporters down there and for the time being it seemed to me that [20:57] you know amongst evangelicals i spoke to amongst like farming communities um you know guys at a [21:04] ball game we were talking to you know there's a kind of they're giving him the benefit of the doubt [21:10] just now but as as one uh as one of the um the pastor said to me at a church you know he said yeah [21:15] they believe it now but things can change in an instant he said you know remember vietnam remember iraq [21:21] and and that's the that's the problem that even donald trump faces which is that you know in a [21:25] democracy public and a public opinion matters and that's in some ways the weakness of democracies that [21:32] governments are at the they are at the mercy of public opinion and if it swings against them it can [21:37] swing against them big time and that can cause huge problems for for even for someone like donald trump [21:42] but i suppose with this conflict with most wars right there's a winner or a loser and you can sort of [21:48] point to who has won and who has lost and who's achieved their objectives and who's compromised [21:51] the most to end the conflict but we're now in a world where donald trump can sort of call his own [21:56] result yeah and he tries to create this reality on the ground he's done i mean this ceasefire is an [22:00] example apparently the israeli security cabinet was still meeting when he announced it so it was like [22:06] he just decided it was scrambled apparently five minutes before it was due to be announced let's [22:10] have to tell the cabinet that's sort of suggesting it was imposed on them yeah yeah and you and he did [22:16] something you know he did similar things didn't he with um you know when he announced the the ceasefire [22:21] that was pretty you know you know it wasn't clear that israel immediately signed up to that so with [22:26] iran so you know these things you know if you say it loud enough and long enough uh it can become true [22:32] and certainly that he believes he has sufficient willpower to do that and sufficient clout to do that [22:37] and then you announce that you're inviting them all to the white house how can they turn it down [22:42] so he knows how to put the pressure on in that sense but sometimes it doesn't stick and of course [22:47] you know the the two weeks these were in terms of the iran side of this uh runs out next tuesday [22:52] and he's just said on the tarmac or on just before getting on to marine one there that um you know if [22:57] there isn't a deal then yeah probably we'll start bombing again and you know neither trump nor netanyahu [23:02] have fulfilled their war aims and we know there have been quite a lot of war aims and they have tended to [23:06] shift but for both of them uh very loudly stated regime changed especially for benjamin netanyahu [23:13] but also for trump in the early days and the other is solving the problem of the the nuclear issue you [23:18] know what happens to 440 kilograms of enriched uranium and for both of them that's a key war aim [23:23] neither of those things will certainly regime hasn't changed although president trump does say [23:28] there are new people but effectively they are the same it's the same structure it may well be [23:34] i saw it described as regime editing yeah or changing the regime rather than regime change [23:42] anyway so neither neither trump nor netanyahu have achieved their war aims so [23:47] back to as gary says what happens next tuesday you know they do have to deliver something on that that's [23:53] not something the public will forget everybody knows what those stated war aims were and everybody's [23:57] going to measure what happens against that i mean it's it's it's it's bewildering and i don't blame [24:04] people at home if they're a bit sort of confused because you know it's not it's not 10 days since [24:09] donald trump did an interview where he said uh when he was asked about the the uranium he says i don't [24:15] care about that he literally said i don't care about that it's buried underground it's just some dust [24:20] that we can monitor from space yeah and now and now it's absolutely so you know sometimes you know and [24:27] certainly i feel this in what i do sometimes you bend over backwards maybe too far backwards to kind [24:33] of construct impose a kind of coherence rationality on this maybe it's not there always i suppose that [24:42] there are there are facts on the ground that we can observe we can uh it's just a sort of bigger [24:47] narrative that he tends to write for himself um let's talk about another conflict so that does [24:52] involve donald trump is there a trump versus vance thing going on gary well i mean it's it's true to [25:00] say that if you're the vice president and uh and you know in any circumstance and there's a you know [25:05] you're two years out from an election you're you are unless you've really messed it up you're probably [25:10] the front runner for the nomination you certainly have massive fundraising uh advantages etc etc and who [25:16] knows whether or not um donald trump getting jd vance involved in this iran thing was a way of sort of [25:21] reining him in a little bit particularly because we know he's not been all that keen on this war [25:28] but the you know the vice president is pretty loyal um and maybe you know he's prepared to take a bit of [25:34] the flack for this and if he can get a deal with the iranians then it's a sort of an advantage to him [25:38] going forward so there's upsides and downsides uh i can't really see many upsides though for [25:44] the vice president or the president um getting in a fight with a pope which is also what they've both [25:49] done come on into that in a second but yeah jane your your take on jade because i was i was [25:54] suggesting to you before we started recording that jd vance had been given this a hospital pass [25:59] i then checked what hospital pass actually is to make sure i understood what it was because it's [26:04] basically in american football when you get thrown the ball but designed in a way where you might really [26:08] injure yourself this is not my i'm much more an expert in international diplomacy than i am [26:16] any sports but um yeah jane you you don't buy the hospital pass theory i i don't i mean you know [26:23] gary gary's right you know it could be that trump wants to bind jd vance into whatever happens in this [26:29] war whatever mess it ends up being or success because it's well known he wasn't keen and vance wasn't keen [26:35] but i think it was really important to have jd vance turning up in pakistan you know [26:40] i think it was air force two he took rather than air force one landing in pakistan someone at that [26:44] level meeting iranian the iranian delegation and they sent their the speaker of their parliament [26:50] that sent very strong signals this was serious these negotiations were serious and when [26:55] jd vance left i never thought that was the end of it i mean talked on newscast at the weekend [27:00] saying you can't expect it all to happen in a day uh you know the fact that it doesn't break down [27:04] and people don't leave in anger but they leave without saying very much but we didn't achieve [27:09] what we wanted but that's not the end of it and i think jd vance is critical to that actually i think [27:14] that he um was important that someone of that stature was sent so not sure it was a hospital pass [27:20] but as you said gary you can't always apply rationality to this but then just to go back to [27:25] the idea of the fight with the pope because i mean that then also gets folded into the trump [27:30] fans relationship because fans is catholic and there are loads of people on a long journey to [27:35] get there but he is yeah well he went on a journey to the vatican to meet the pope which there's lots [27:39] of pictures and that's sort of been folded into a whole like oh is donald trump picking a fight with [27:44] the pope oh he has again by the way just another one yeah yeah he's had another go at the pope while [27:48] he was uh on the you know preparing to what did he say this time oh you know i mean it's very interesting [27:54] because um jd vance said the other day you know pope should be really careful when he you know [27:59] talks about theology and you think well actually that is the pope's job yeah to work theology and [28:05] sort of theological justifications for war and whatever but uh donald trump is saying you know [28:10] the pope has a right to his opinions but he has a right to criticize him of course if you're one of [28:14] the 52 american 52 million american catholics you don't think the pope just has opinions you think [28:20] he's the vicar of christ right he's literally christ representative so despite having increased [28:27] his support amongst american catholics and they are sizable and they vote you know um donald trump is [28:33] running the risk of of um seriously alienating them you know in the same way also seriously alienating [28:42] the evangelicals by posing memes of him pretending to be christ although he says he was being a doctor [28:49] well take a look for yourself and jane i suppose in a sort of world historical view it's a reminder [28:53] that popes actually have been very political on the world stage and maybe we've just got used to [28:57] the idea that they're not that that political with a capital p no and i think this pope is very [29:02] political as i think he said on his african tour he's come out and said it's wrong for billionaires [29:07] billions to be spent on wars for political aims well who could he be referring to and he so he [29:14] didn't pull back either i think he's he's out there and he's willing also to make pretty political [29:19] statements yeah i mean i i think donald trump can't resist um sort of responding when criticized that's [29:29] the that's part of the issue here there's a lot of leaders would just you know move on let the pope [29:35] say what he wants to say you know and not pick a fight in that way donald trump has this itch he has [29:41] to scratch when whoever he's criticized by that could be anyone is you know could be a a soap opera [29:47] actor one day it can be the pope uh the next you know he he can't resist and of course you know he [29:54] has has all no this is not his first clash he's also posted pictures of himself as as the pope you [30:01] know ai generated pictures of himself with the pope so um and we saw those messages didn't we the other [30:06] day you know praise be to allah and all these kind of bellicose uh truth social so he's he doesn't [30:12] mind sort of really getting stuck into um that kind of religious rhetoric and taking on religious [30:18] figures or the itch you know look at the keir starmer comments you know just when you think [30:23] he can't say it again then then he does the the keir starmer's no churchill or disappointment in the [30:29] british navy or you know this this is an itch that keeps being scratched as well by donald trump right [30:34] it's been a very busy thursday evening in the newscast studio gary lovely to see you in person [30:38] you too and jane thanks for coming back too oh it's great to be here