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Talk about Newsnight

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Monday, 12th February, 2007

  • Newsnight
  • 12 Feb 07, 04:50 PM

ahmadinejad_203.jpgWhat should the US and Britain do about the Iran problem? Also, Stephanie Flanders on inflation; and we discuss whether or not petitions are actually a good indicator of public opinion.

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  • 1.
  • At 10:42 PM on 12 Feb 2007,
  • coppicat wrote:

Now I'm not Freud, but I know enough about psychology to now that Miliband's telling porkies...
Look how much he blinked during his interview with the Pax-Man...
Now there's a fibber if ever

  • 2.
  • At 10:49 PM on 12 Feb 2007,
  • Steven wrote:

I really can't see the point in David Miliband going on Newsnight in order to spend the entire interview saying nothing and giving evasive answers to direct questions. The whole "Reviewing logs" story just sounds like complete rubbish. How long does it take to search logs (presumably electronic) for the word "Hungary"?

  • 3.
  • At 12:14 AM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • Hamid Irani wrote:

The West should accept that the only solution to the Iranian problem is an Iranian one.

The West should support, not hinder the Iranian people.

Prof. Raymond Tanter is correct to say that the United States and the EU should remove the PMOI from the terrorist list.

  • 4.
  • At 12:33 AM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • Billy Adair wrote:

Why did Jeremy Paxman not persist and ask Miliband 11 times, as he did with the Tory Michael Howard, the same question.
And why did Jeremy not realise that the time taken to look at transport logs would be about 10 minutes. So why was Miliband relying on such a feeble excuse for not knowing.

Miliband was only interested in the enquiry and his career not in sorting out the current dangers.

  • 5.
  • At 12:58 AM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • Philip Clayton wrote:

I felt so sorry for Ms Flanders problems with inflation. They were solely centred on the very well off and wealthy. It has never been so expensive to be rich. The costs of child care and cleaners and nannies. The cost of children, oh my dear! My heart truly bleeds for her.

I am a single parent, on Income Support, in temporary accommodation provided by the council. I was supposed to be here for 12 months and I have been here for almost three years. I have been told that i will never be housed permanently and all there is available to me is accommodation at 拢325-385 per week.

This is paid for by central government, mainly through Housing Association Subsidiaries, to largely private landlords. Making already wealthy people even wealthier. It would be cheaper to buy me a house. There are 77,000 families in this situation in London alone.

If I go into one of these properies and subsequently try to work, I will be allowed to earn my living expenses which are set at Income Support level. Every pound after that will see 65p in every pound deducted. If I was on minimum wage I would be working for 拢1.65p per hour.

The man who lived in this flat before me, Chris, had a very much younger partner and a baby. They were waiting to be housed when his teenage son from his previous marriage showed up after being kicked out by his mother.

Because of this situation they were immediately rehoused in one of these schemes in the situation described above. Chris was unskilled and drove a van for a living. He had been working since he was 15 years old and had never been unemployed, sick, or on the dole.

His earnings after tax were 拢230 p.w. and he was assessed as having to pay 拢160 p.w. towards the rent. How was he supposed to keep himself, his partner, baby, and teenage son on 拢60 p.w.? He couldn't and gave up work. Thus placing an extra burden on the state. Brilliant eh? Now imagine the pressures on that family and how an unskilled man copes with no regular routine. What a wonderful system.

What are the alternatives for me? I cannot rent privately because where I live, in North Finchley, London, the cheapest 2 bed flat is 拢220 p.w. and housing benefit only allows 拢175 p.w. I have been told that I should make up the shortfall out of my weekly benefit. Then tell me how I live.

Now, where I live is a one bedroom flat, including tiny kitchen, extremely small living room, where I sleep and a tiny bathroom, which unless my eyes deceive me is smaller that Ms Flanders Kitchen.

My income is 拢107 p.w. and 拢67 per month Child Benefit.

I have service charges for electricity, gas, and water, of 拢18.60 p.w., or 拢74.40p per month, which is more, despite price increases, than some pople pay for a 3 bed house.

Because there is nowhere to plumb in a washing machine (and it would be forbidden anyway) I pay 拢10 p.w. laundry charges, plus the 4 hours it takes to do it, or the equivalent of 2 brand new washing machines annually.

I pay 拢15 p.w. to cover my phone line, internet access and pay as you go mobile phone. So I pay 拢43.60p p.w. in fixed outgoings before I buy food, clothes,treats for my son, entertainment of great extravagance such as the cinema, or swimming, or any form of travel costs, or holidays.

In the last 12 months my food costs for veg has risen by 27 and a half percent because of the harsh summer; my travel costs have increased on the buses by 50% and on the Underground by 20%; the costs of bread, cheese, eggs, fish and meat have increased by approximately 20% in the last 12 months.

My Child benefit has just been increased by 45p p.w. and I expect my Income Support to be increased by approximately 拢1.79p p.w.

If I went back to work in any manner I would be eligible for 拢50 p.w. towards child care as long as I earned less than 拢16,000 p.a. How much does Ms Flanders pay for Nannies?

Now my son is 7 I would like to try and return to work. However, I am unskilled. I used to be a chef but can no longer run restaurants. I cannot work nights, weekends, bank holidays etc. I cannot work in contract catering because I would have to start at 7.00-7.30 a.m. The only other option in my trade is school dinners. Guess what? The reason peiople like me do not work in them is because I could work all week and be worse off.

I would like to re-train. Every enquiry I have made has been met with a rebuff.

My current benefits amount to 拢202 p.w. If I return to work there is no point, with child care costs and travel costs, unless I can be paid sufficient money for a nett income of 拢380-400 p.w. Childcare costs would be at least 拢120 p.w. and travel 拢30 which would leave me 拢20-50 p.w. better off.

What Ms Flanders never pointed out in her piece on inflation was how much cheaper many things are for richer people as a percentage of their income, e.g. travel, council tax, food, energy, leisure, clothes, entertainment.

It costs me the same price to travel on the tube as it does for her; it costs me the same to buy a cinema or theatre ticket as it does her; it costs me more per unit of energy than it does her; if I could afford to go to the same restaurants that she does it would cost me the same as it does her. But for Ms Flanders these are not considerastions as she can afford to do pretty much what she likes.

Her report on inflation was narrow, circumscribed, disingenuous, and above all smug. It simultaneously made a case for how ill she was being treated by life and visually showing how wealthy she is. Oh my dears, a mere 拢80,000 pounds a year puts you in the middle classes.

Thus the 大象传媒 remains ever the same. No concern with poverty, or even any conception of it. No understanding of the time bomb that a lack of housing for poor people like myself is creating. This lack is clearly the major driver of racist attitudes among the poor; it is clearly the major driver behind anti-social behaviour; it is almost cetainly a major driver behind drug and alcohol abuse; it is probably the major driver behind the suppliers of drugs, they see it as their only route out.

Never mind. Ms Flanders can whitter on about how hard she is done by, how her life is full of despair, how terrible inflation is for her, how expensive her child is, this is terribly important news to a programme called News night.

Why has poverty, and particularly homelessness which is at the root of most of it, become an invisible subject for all political parties and all media? Why are we subjected to a lengthy piece on the sufferings of people who only get paid 拢80,000 a year?

Nothing to do with the fact that most of the people making the programmes are in the same bracket, is it?

White, Oxbridge educated, nannied and servanted, two houses, skiing holidays de rigeur, and all they can talk about is how stressful and dreadful their lives are. I'll swap with them any day.

Keep up the good work 大象传媒.

  • 6.
  • At 01:27 AM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • Liam Coughlan wrote:

Milliband spoke volumes on Newsnight. Here is a man that whose arrogance oozes and seems willing to appear on Newsnight frequently as the programme appears to support his environmental tax-and-behave policies. Its a pity nobody questioned him on the carbon effects of transporting millions of tons of turkeys from Hungary to the UK and back every week, not to mind lapses in controls that permitted the deadly birdflu to enter the UK. His performance on this issue has been poor. He seems to want to protect the interests of the mass fowl industry above the public interest in keeping the UK disease free.

Newspaper reports linking him with a possible leadership bid against Mr Browne have no doubt assuaged his ego further. He throttled out wodges of nonsense to Jeremy tonight, and failed to answer the simplest of Jeremy's questions. Here is Mr Green himself.

This is the face of the New New Labour. God help us all.

By the way, the senseless Newsnght poll on Tony Blair, a song and a pot of custard was unfairly dragged out to illustrate the nonsense of e-petitioning. That scene suggested that because 2000 losers voted on the website to see Tony Blair sing a song of sixpence from a custard jar, that such polling was inaccurate, irrelevant and nonsensical. This was to imply that the e-petition against road price chagring that has attracted 1.2million registered voters in the UK is a similar freak result. Though the Minister has already said he'll take no notice of the views of millions of angry motorists, I'll bet the same motorists will be waiting for New Labour in the High Grass.

I thought Monday night's highlight was Jeremy's interview with Stephen Milliband (13/10) - and yes he was highly evasive! Stephen was utterly c**p - and it showed. Mark's graphics were superb as always. Interesting debate on Iran with Sir Richard Dalton & Con Couglin. Oh and I did vote in the Newsnight poll - about Tony Blair standing in a barrel of custard singing "we're going to hang out the washing on the Siegfried line," and I liked the suggestion that Tony should do it for Comic Relief. What a sight it should be!!!!!!

oops - I meant David Miliband!(That's how insignificant he is - I can't even recall his name properly!!)

  • 9.
  • At 08:32 AM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • dave wrote:

Do you ever watch the news closely?

Ever wondered where the governement starts and stops?

Money is like energy. It can never be created or destroyed in a sense. Money equates to the total value of goods and services of a country.

The increase in the quantity of currency unit cannot in a sense be worth more. Just that inflation and deflation accounts for its relative worth.

For example - if a loaf of bread was all that was around of tradable value 1 billion years ago then that loaf of bread would equal the total sum of all goods and services existing today! In so much that if the scarecity of resources equal 1 today (in some random quantity) then the scarecity of resources must have been 1 a billion years ago.

That loaf of may well have given rise to an increase in possible services that if that service was 100% efficient then the trading of the scare bread would increase in more services of bread enveloping more oppotunity and work and so more provision of bread for more people. Eventually that service would generate new ideas, such as the possiblility of utilisd farming in both new goods and new services, giving rise to uses in other materials which become apart of the system of trade and so forth. What happens is that the loaf of bread is relatively worth less in the grand scheme of peoples wants and desires, so that if there were a unit of 1 at the beginning, there still is a unit of worth 1, but that unit must be split so hence a unit of 1 can be split into 100 pennies since the provision of goods and services can be diluted and distributed amongst more people.


Hard to understand, but basic economics. Everthing (literally) should be accounted for in a system of economics to provide the full efficient running of the world ( I am a fan of new economics). This should involve the amount of time and matter involved in the provision of anything, infact to be fully effcient and benifit from what economics was meant to do it should infact transend time and money and include efforts and quality of life.

Imagine an equation that was general but spidered out to more complexities, in so much it modelled a perfect living environment for all.

For instance - simply if a systems of supply and demands factored in all things (inequalities also) then a fully fuctioning world might have less goods and services but a better increase in quality of life. Factor in pollution, asthetics, oppotunity, basic quality of life for all and then we have an even distribution of wealth and quality of life. A system of extreame competition is some sense is like a curse, you shouldn't strive more for a better quality of life, but stive at the same pace for a better quality of life.

Above is a pretty simple and basic example of what I am trying to explain. (lots of holes can be poked and replugged into it tho)

Back to the news. We get loads of figures and sets of opinions from opposing forces, but the system of politics should remind us to always evaluate the quality of statistics and opinions not only that but further out of the box we need to evaluate the quality of statistics and facts when put together, figures and facts should never be accepted in quality for its sole individuality. It may be true that employment has gone up by 5%, in may be true that oppotunity has increased in avalible jobs by 10%, in may be true that average salaries has gone up by 10%, and that goods and services has increased; sounds good, but.................... if the average hours spent at work has increased to the imbalence and expense of leisure then the quality of life over all must decrease. If you have only 100 years to live and you spend 40% of that time working then you have 60% to sleep and do personal work. if you earn more money then you need to spend more in a shorter space of time due to the lack of leisure time, so you have a high quality of life in shorter pockets of time whereas of you were poorer you might have a better balence of work and leisure time.

so what has happened. People are on average less happier than they were 5- 10 years ago (there is various sources), why? how do you measure happiness? you scale it and average the people questioned in relative to previous data.

So heres the govenment trick, it sll politics (and that is a nasty business), you trick people into thinking theyre doing ok.

First the govenment increase the amounts of goods and services at the expense of our lesuire in so much that our jobs will require us to work more but earn more, except that the actual benifits of working more in monetary terms are siphoned off at the corperate source in terms of taxes. This gives rise to the cost of living and leisure going up, but we don't really notice cos we all spend too much time thinking and doing more work. These taxes should be benificial to the country or the world (which is personally good enough for me) except that it is ploughed into an effcient public system of pointless services (red tape), so the taxes would have worked better in the private sector (public sector is a good thing but in its ineffcient for it is bad, very bad). How do we think that things are getting better?

Technology and sophisticated asththetics (mostly in the form of improved and abundent skills) allow us to imerge ourselves in an environment of false security. Skills should be used to further innovation and increase not just entrepeneurs but new entrpeurnership (like the internet) not redress current innovations and entrepeurships (this can be backed up by the amounts of new businesses rising and an increase in failing businesses)

Another skill of the government is to allow the flow of oppotunity to increase, it is true there are more recruitment agencies and more temp jobs than ever (budgets are tight and fluctuating due to microeconomics for all businesses), this can be a good or bad thing from a certain point of view, but from a government perspective it is bad, tho it should allow for flow of wealth and equal distribution. Macro economics pool things together and on average keep figures on the straight and narrow. This is like enron on a national scale, i think.

Decreasing the amount of workforce avaliable in flux allows for a more constricted and so undilution of wealth, in so much that a proportion of the population is technically put into suspended animation and the rest benifit form their inactivity in a sense. For fear of sounding like a conspiricy theorist i will say this; students are on the increase in uni, this proportion of population is on a fixed and borrowed income in terms of debt transending through the rest of thier life, the govenment is technically using people as investment capital (because if that money is tied up there is a part of the chancellors budget that will not be in surplus and also a proportion of that budget may or would have to spent of other mandotory requiredments, IMF schools, etc). Are people really being put into jail more because their is more crime, or is it that there their standard of living can be contolled, and it helps maintain employment oppotunity and all government figures. Propaganda and clever PR is all in the works as well to convince us Otherwise.

It is easy to see how a logical being would think of people as quantities in the grand scheme of things, but that thought process in the hands of a powerful economist is a bad thing even more so if he is a politician as well. A more applied economist should think differently and more humanely.

Another powerful tool of the government, is legislation, which is like an exact science, it allows lots of people to co exist and function and is the intangiable framework of our sociaty which we adhere to conciously or subconciously and should always be enforceable within the same system of law, its a self fuctioning entity that works on the combined collective ethics and morales of a given population.

To mask the relative way we live where students are tricked and bound into false oppotunity (cos there can't be as many skilled jobs out there to match the qualificatons avaliable) and the polarrisation of wealth (which eventually happens as labour market forces move to undistribute wealth again to the more prestigious job titiles since actual business income are being siphoned off through corporate taxation;pay gap widening) the government changes laws on alcohol and investment in arts to increase our enjoyablity in other areas (messing with our minds), fashion etc, we are forced to live off the succeseses of other countries as well in an intangiable way. Also noticable is the redirection of law enforcement from more yielding national crimes, is this to allow for greater prosecutions and imprisionments? (does this both improve govenment figures on crime and also help to pan the economic figures? 1 prisoner may cost 100,000 in a life time, but may cost 1million to the total economy if left to live in private!)

such things are easily marked and put down as silly conjecture and conspiricies cos a system so complex couldn;t allow such things to happen, until a master profesor in economics or appied mathematics can easily show in quantifying terms the true national economic equation not the official vague (although complex) equation given my the central bank.

When were enjoying ourselves on credit cards, flux in job temping, pension changes, alcohol consumption, highly explosive mortgages and investments and allowances in entertainments, false sense of rights and crime figures, how can we complain in that short false sense of security?

Isn't it strange that the effects of the all these changes affect the potential in future votes? a few secured gerenations will remeber time of happiness within a certain government.


Over period of time, things are likely to fail, unless all the inequalities are plugged in time. This may just an unconventianl way of dealing with things.

Two subjects of massive economical consequence largely avaoided in the press, The wars and the pension crisis. The war may very well have be unintetonal and stretched the budget to the Chancelloers dismay and forces had to go into play to prevent political suicide by economics, and the unforseen life expectancy and pensions of the future which the chancellor may have hoped that private market forces could plug. If the wealth in a bubble of total life expectancy of total population has just been shifted to down the time line (and just yielding public votes for the future) then still spiphoning off through taxation will just eventually yield poverty later on in life. May be taking it a step too far is saying that poverty in a later stage of life will have population control properties, especially with longer working.

Its all strange that I am sure if all things were plugged into an economic model that every descision has an economic consequence (note not a true benifit).

On a more humane level, if you look at the distructure and morphing of sociaty and the incresing problem with depression and stagnation, people are losing sight of whats wrong, this sould be warning signs enough to take good look at the environment around us.

Ive no doubt the chancellor is a really really bright man who may mean well, but the direction and the way people are used are unacceptable, leaders are choosen to make hard descision not in humane methods of manipulation. Could this be?

I am no expert but I generally am sensitive to my environment and try to speedily explain things, ive no doubt I could go on writing for hours and trying to mathematically and more definitively explain things but Ive neither the grammer or maths of that caliber to do so. Is there anyone who can?

  • 10.
  • At 10:08 AM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • Mandy wrote:

A big thank you and well done to the well balanced 大象传媒 Newsnight programme on Iran.

Of course the only real solution for Iran is to let the Iranian people and their organised Resistace movement mainly the Mojahedin of Iran (PMOI)sort it out themselves. Neither appeasement nor war are a good solution. In fact fruitless appeasement will only make war inevitable.

  • 11.
  • At 10:31 AM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • Brian Kelly wrote:

Milliband was uneasy with the Q's & must be applauded in political terms for evading JP questions , albeit as another commentator stated he (JP)wasn't as persuasive & bullyboy as is normal!!... some would also say DM was telling porkies or maybe turkeys!.... a red herring trail may do the full circle & land back in his lap.
Whatever, don't those vehicles travelling between Suffolk-Hungary-Suffolk present an even greater (unnecessary) risk!
I understood that any area in an exclusion zone, the less traffic(foot & vehicle) & goods entering & exiting site the better... we all know it makes sense.. except DEFRA,FSA & BM, it seems!
As an aside to the foregoing issues, I believe many consumers will have been put off purchasing FACTORY farming produce when they see/hear the animal living & transportation conditions!

  • 12.
  • At 10:55 AM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • Pari wrote:

It was a breath of fresh air to finally hear some support for the victims of the Iranian regime, the Iranian opposition People's Mojahedin Organisation of Iran (PMOI). Many thousands of Mujahedin have been executed by the Iran regime and many remain the political prisons today. In my view also realistically the Mojahedin of Iran are only option for solving the big problem of Iran without a foreign war. And as rightly said by Telegraph Editor I think negotiation will never work.

  • 13.
  • At 11:05 AM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • Moses wrote:

The 大象传媒 in its piece on Iran indicated the real solution to solving the problem and that is the support of the Iranian people and their resistance movement. We have seen the failures of war and we have seen the failures of appeasement. To still advocate more appeasement is an extremely dangerous policy as up till now all that it has gained is to allow the Iranian regime to suppress its people more, interfere in Iraqi affairs to an even greater extent leading to the deaths of thousands of Iraqi civilians and allied troops and furthermore it has given the Iranian regime years to progress its nuclear bomb.
Appeasement was the policy that lead to the PMOI being placed on the list of terrorist organisations in the first place. It has been reported on countless occasions and was in fact admitted by the former foreign secretary Jack Straw that the PMOI was only ever placed on the list at the behest of the Iranian regime.
Now the time has come to remove the PMOI from the list and support it as what it is, a democratic movement trying to bring peace and freedom to its people who have suffered immensely under the mullahs.

Congratulations to Newsnight for a very broad-minded piece.

  • 14.
  • At 12:09 PM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • Hatty wrote:

The report on the H5N1 outbreak in Suffolk included a map of Hungary - labelling the locations of farms and abattoirs which may be the possible source of the virus.... So far, so good. However, when it came to trying to pronounce the names of the towns involved the reporter mangled the place names beyond all recognition.

Now I know Hungarian is an odd language, but Hungary is an EU country, there are lots of Hungarians resident in the UK. Come on, Newsnight - surely you could have found someone to ask how to pronounce "Szentes" rather than just guessing and getting it so horribly wrong?!

  • 15.
  • At 01:52 PM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • Hanif wrote:

The Iranian Mojahedin are the only hope for the people of Iran. More than 120,000 of their members and supporters have been executed by the blood-thirsty mullahs ruling Iran.
If the U.S. wants to prevent the rise of another fascist dictatorship in the international arena, it should promply remove the Mojahedin from its blacklist.
A quarter-century of appeasing the mullahs has failed. To avoid another war, America and Europe should give political backing to the Mojahedin to bring about democratic change in Iran.

  • 16.
  • At 02:08 PM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • Farzaneh wrote:

On Iran.......Mr Tanter raised some good points as to how the west should deal with the Iranian regime.

It is time the west stops 'flirting' with the Iranian regime and supports the Iranian people and their resistance movement, the People's Mojahedin of Iran for democratic change in Iran.

Without regime change in Iran we can forget any chance of peace and stability in Iraq, Palestine, Lebanon and indeed the whole of the Middle East.

  • 17.
  • At 02:17 PM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • Patrick wrote:

Well said Hanif.

Hopefully the America and Europe will act before another war in the Middle East becomes inevitable.

  • 18.
  • At 04:10 PM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • Alan C wrote:

For anyone unfamiliar with the bizarre apocalyptic ambitions of the Iranian regime read this:

British and Europeans politicians (notably Jack Straw) have repeatedly abased themselves before the mullahs in a futile program of appeasement. The Iranian people deserve our wholehearted support and their leaders deserve nothing but our unreserved contempt.

  • 19.
  • At 04:20 PM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • Maurice - Northumberland - Former UK wrote:

Iran is just one element that the Western World faces from Islam.
I'd advise those who are not aware of the purpose of the Iron and Bamboo curtains to read up, these two curtains served not only the separation of incompatible ideologies, but were a peaceful method in doing so.
I suggest a similar Curtain between the Islamic World and the rest.
It's not unusual to find the answers in history!
Otherwise what is going on globally will be never ending.

The continuation of Chamberlain Political appeasement can only result in the same disaster of 1939-45 x 10.

Dear Philip (#5),

I was sorry to read your comments. If you watch the item again (it is on the main Newsnight website - or you can go here: I don鈥檛 think you'll find any complaint from me about "how hard done by I am, full of despair etc. etc." Quite the opposite - as Anatole Kaletsky said at the end of the piece, it may be more expensive to be rich these days, but that is a pretty nice problem to have.

I have responded to your comments in detail below. But just in case you don't get to the end, can I ask you to send me a contact number and the best time to reach you? We are interested in doing a piece with you about your situation.

My goal in making yesterday's film was to find out whether papers like the Telegraph and the Mail are correct to say that the inflation figures are not painting an accurate picture of the cost of living. The question I pose at the start is: "is this just middle class whinging, or is there something more fundamental going on"?

My explanation for the difference in perceptions was:(a) the new official target, CPI, is less representative of our total cost of living than the RPI; and (b) the richest households are excluded from the figures because they are so rich, as are some of the people worst hit by recent energy price rises, namely very poor pensioners. I don't say anything about feeling sorry for those top 4% - I do say they are likely to complain loudly and carry disproportionate sway with editorial writers at papers like the Telegraph.

However, as we discussed with the man from Capital Economics, even accounting for those distortions there is now an unusually large gap in inflation rates across different parts of the population. Broadly, rich and middle class families and pensioners face a higher rate and young people face a low rate. There is a structural explanation: globalization means that goods are getting cheaper and services are getting more expensive. Partly due to the same process, the rich are getting richer, and since they consume a lot more services as a share of their income that, too, is pushing up the price of services that richer people want.

So, to answer the initial question: yes, it is middle class whinging - and whinging from upper class people who might think they were middle class but, as we learn in the piece, are actually in the top 4%. But there is also something structural going on, namely globalization driving down the relative price of goods.

Like most 大象传媒 correspondents, I'm in a relatively affluent two-earner household and I mentioned that I have a relatively higher rate of inflation. I could have pretended otherwise, and not chosen to film in my house. But given that the film was partly about how the well-off have a skewed perception of reality, I thought it was more honest to put my cards on the table (not to mention my son). I think it's silly and possibly insulting for comfortable 大象传媒 reporters in London to pretend we are Mr or Mrs Average - or even worse, that we face the same challenges as someone such as yourself. I suspect you would agree. But it would indeed be outrageous to suggest that affluent people deserve special concern and sympathy for rising costs. That is why I gave Anatole Kaletsky (quoted above) the last word. I am sorry if you took away the opposite impression.

As I said at the start - we'd be very interested in following up your story. You might call it balance for my piece - but I think it deserves coverage in its own right.

I look forward to hearing from you.

All the best

Stephanie Flanders

  • 21.
  • At 07:13 PM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • M Stokes wrote:

Dear Presenter/Editor,

Tonight, I felt compelled to write and appreciate a well balanced view of news about Iran. It was refreshing to see Mr. Ramond Tanter and editor of Telegraph to have been able to air their views. About time too.

I am sorry to note that the ex British Ambassador to Iran advocating to continue the policy of further diplomatic neg. with Iran. Does he take into his calculation the effect that such policies have had in the past 18 years or in the long term in the region, Britain and globally?

I would like to encourage you to make a difference. Ask the Government what actually motivates them to continue the appeasement policy with Government in Iran. Are they hiding their head in the sand for some reason? Do they think they can wish the vicious nature of this terrorist regime to go away? Do they think if there is a dictatorship ruling Iran, the British Government or nation will prosper by getting closer with this regime?

I would like to suggest that if we are interested in global PEACE, we have to pay attention to the activities of the regime ruling Iran now. That is primarily what she does in Iraq to discredit the coalition, how she treats her own nation and finally by establishing nuclear power how they want to take forward their ambition to become the world Islamic Government rulers. What they do to reach their objective is our business and we must bring them to account rather than give them even more weapons to go about their evil ideas.

Tonight the producers of the News Night went a step closer to add to the credibility of 大象传媒 which seemed a little shaky recently.

Thank you,

  • 22.
  • At 11:45 PM on 13 Feb 2007,
  • Matthew B wrote:

I think it is interesting that the 大象传媒 proposes a debate on "The Iran Problem". This immediately suggests that Iran is a country that must be dealt with in some way. Are they a threat because they want nuclear power? The media have been actively involved in creating the impression that something must be done. After the US has made half-hearted attempts at diplomacy, with some feeble UK help no doubt, the 大象传媒 will then prepare us for the inevitable strike against Iran.

  • 23.
  • At 12:18 PM on 14 Feb 2007,
  • chris wrote:

Philip@5 in this society unless you have been to a good university, got middle class family to back you the best way forward for anyone who has the kind of articulation you show is to sart a business otherwise you will always either be a slave or a dependent. If you have no money to start a business learn how to use a free website building application like mozilla composer (its easy) and market yourself as much as possible. Its a wast of time complaining, the thing is to start doing ! Its now possible to do on very low money with the www.

  • 24.
  • At 12:07 PM on 15 Feb 2007,
  • Maurice - Northumberland wrote:

Maybe this will give some a clue as to what goes on inside Iran, the fully established and functioning Islamic Republic:-

  • 25.
  • At 02:09 PM on 15 Feb 2007,
  • Tim wrote:

Maurice: Who runs iranfocus.com ?

  • 26.
  • At 03:28 PM on 15 Feb 2007,
  • Maurice - Northumberland wrote:

Tim:

I have no idea, there is an 'About Us' button, there also is an 'Iran in the World press' button.
The contents are as you will see from the worlds press/media including the Iranian Press.

So I suggest it is in the main a portal to different sources of information.

Just as the TheReligionOfPeace.com web site is a collection and links to various sources of news.

  • 27.
  • At 08:07 PM on 15 Feb 2007,
  • shamim wrote:

You should always try to have good reports and programs like this .

I do not really believe in 大象传媒 at all and some times we see some true from 大象传媒 but another day we see it does return to it's nature again .

I want to say this program about Iran was ok and you better keep on going like this I do not undrestand why saying to make bad people happy if they are bad so tell the tru and make them unhappy.
shamim

  • 28.
  • At 03:54 PM on 16 Feb 2007,
  • anna wrote:

excellent piece on Iran......the Iranian people should be encouraged to put an end to the Iranian regime which executes their people and is responsible for much of the terrorism we see in Iraq.

  • 29.
  • At 01:44 AM on 22 Feb 2007,
  • Ronnie wrote:

Thank god I am an atheist
I can鈥檛 believe the hypocrisy and the constant verbhorea that spews from the mouths of some of the people that bring religion into war; don鈥檛 you know that religion has caused more wars than any other issue of conflict?
And don鈥檛 tell me that British troops play the game by the book because that is absolute rubbish,
Soldiers of all nations are guilty of atrocities, torture, rape and looting and how about this as an actual example, when the Yugoslav conflict started there were many mercenaries sent in to play the war games, I knew of one who was sent to fight along side of the Chetniks they are the Roman Catholic or the Croatian contingent for those not aware, so he was fighting against the Muslims and this is what turned his stomach and be aware that this was the actions of the British mercenaries women and children raped, tortured and murdered just because they were Muslim and one pregnant woman had her baby cut out of her stomach while she was still alive and then some bright spark decides to replace it with a cat and proceeded to sew it up inside her, so this guy decides this is not for me and decides to fight on the Bosnian side with the Muslims and his former c/o tried to kill him when he got back to England, I will not go into anymore detail on this subject but you must understand war is a filthy pastime and as long as there are those willing to kill and perform barbaric acts then there will never be peace of any kind on this planet.

Yes some Muslim鈥檚 have an agenda but so do some Jew鈥檚, Christian鈥檚, Hindu鈥檚 and Buddhist鈥檚
If you combine any of these elements with the aspirations of Bankers and corporate business then you have the answer to the true warmongers of this world.
Nobody went to the aid of the poor or the people that opposed Pinochet and his murderer鈥檚 in fact the U.S and U.K supported them the US providing arms and the US providing leg irons and torture equipment made in Sheffield stamped on them, yes that鈥檚 the role our governments covertly play so before you point the finger look to your own household for the filth that lurks under the carpet, that鈥檚 the role Thatcher played for Britain. In the 80鈥檚
By the way the Malvinas/Falklands conflict no sign of the Yanks offering to help there was there? But some of their armaments as well as French armaments were killing British troops, and back to the killing, did you know that over 900 Argentine conscripts were executed on those islands with no trial at all? Well they wont tell you that on the news will they> after all we are British and we do not do things like that.
There We Are Then
Sleep well. This has been Ronnie venting his spleen on behalf of Radio truth
鈥淎wake From Unconsciousness鈥

  • 30.
  • At 06:38 PM on 22 Feb 2007,
  • Maurice - Northumberland wrote:

In direct relation to Iran:-

Does the female Iranian really have a chance?

  • 31.
  • At 07:27 PM on 01 Mar 2007,
  • wrote:

"What should the US and Britain do about the Iran problem?"

Iraq+Oil+Bush+Blair=Invasion.

Iran+Oil+Bush+Blair=Invasion.

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