January 14, 2025 • 36 mins
Tulip Siddiq, until today the government’s anti-corruption minister, has resigned over alleged, er, corruption. Andy, Helen, Adam and Tim Minogue discuss the Eye’s history with the wilted Tulip, all the way back to 2016. Plus, everything about grooming gangs *except* a certain petulant billionaire, and the very latest news on David ‘Rommel’ Montgomery.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Andy (00:05):
Hi everybody.
Andrew here.
Just a quick pre- Page 94 announcement,potentially a first, I think,
the conversation you're about tohear was recorded in the Private
Eye offices yesterday afternoon.
The first section of yesterday's showwas all about Tulip Siddiq, then the
government's antique corruption ministerwho had been in the news recently
in a not completely favorable way.
(00:26):
Since we recorded that episode just 24hours ago, Siddiq has resigned as the
government's anti-corruption minister.
It's very clear to us that, number10 heard that we were going to be
covering it on this week's Page94 and thought the game's up.
We better roll over now.
So when you hear us talk about Siddiqas the anti-corruption minister in
the present, just try to rephrasethat as the very, very recent past.
(00:49):
But as you're about to hear thingsgo back much further than that,
between Tulip Siddiq and Private Eye.
Maisie (00:54):
Page 94, the Private Eye Podcast
Andy (00:57):
Hello and welcome to another episode of Page 94.
My name is Andrew Hunter Murray, and I'mhere in the Private Eye office with Helen
Lewis, Adam MacQueen and Tim Minogue.
We are here to discuss stories thathave been in the news recently, and
our first one this week is all aboutTulip Siddiq who you may have heard of.
She is the anti-corruption minister, andshe has been in the papers recently quite
(01:18):
a bit because of some rather unorthodoxhousing arrangements she's made.
now you may well know a lot of ministersget a nice residence to live in.
Maybe it's Chequers.
If you're the pm, maybe it's chiefing.
these tend to be owned by the government.
It's a bit rarer for them to be ownedby large Bangladeshi companies, which
have links to your family members.
(01:39):
Nonetheless, that's what'sbeen happening recently.
Tulip Siddiq's aunt is the PM ofBangladesh, or rather she was until
August last year when she was deposed.
Since then, the family have beenaccused of an extraordinary amount
of embezzlement, billions ofpounds, all to do with various
dodgy contracts for nuclear powerstations and that kind of thing.
(02:00):
these accusations have beenleveled and it turns out that
various members of C'S family.
Have been living in extremelynice homes that belong actually
to Bangladeshi companies.
Now, she has denied wrongdoing.
She's referred herself tothe PM's independent advisor
on minister's interests.
But it does remain true that there is asubstantial number of houses that she's
either been given, family members havebeen given, or family members have been
(02:22):
allowed to stay in rent free or connectedto the world of Bangladeshi politics.
So we thought this wouldbe fun to talk about.
And the fact is, Tim Minogue,you were there first.
Tim (02:32):
This would be just over two years ago, under the
headline, ' Travails With My Aunt'.
Well done that chief sub...
we reported that, Tulip's mother,Rehana, IE Auntie Hasina's sister, was
living rent free in a, very agreeableNorth London house, which was owned
(02:54):
by a man called Shaikh Fazlur Rahman,the executive director of Bangladesh's
largest con conglomerate, Beximco.
Beximco had allegedly benefited duringSheikh Hasina's time in office, with debts
written off and being granted exclusiverights to, distribute the AstraZeneca.
(03:15):
vaccine during Covid.
there is clear evidence of, people whowere close to the regime, wealthy people,
shall we say, doing, favors to the family.
And it now turns out that there wereat least six properties, were either
gifted to or rented cheap to Tulipor Tulip's close relatives in London.
(03:38):
It's ironic that she's theanti-corruption minister,
Helen (03:41):
Can I say something that I think is liable safe, which is whether or
not this is proved to be corruption.
I just don't know who thesepeople are who get given houses.
But random people,
I we're not just
Adam (03:50):
talking houses, we are talking luxury houses.
Some of them in the right, inthe center of London, aren't we?
this is, these are millions that worth.
Helen (03:56):
I feel like it was not impossible to foresee that this
might come up again once she wasmade anti-corruption minister.
That's the fi the bit aboutthis story that I find.
Adam (04:04):
Yes, that's the extraordinary thing.
That just seems to be, to me, another caseof Keir Starmer not, even, not spotting
a tiger trap in front of him, actuallysharpening the spikes in the bottom of the
tiger trap laying the leaves over himself.
It just give her a different job.
Isn't these stories are circulated?
Yeah.
Corruption minister.
Yeah.
For corruption, you mean?
Tim (04:22):
Now the, other aspect of it that I think is interesting and that we wrote
about at least as far back as 2016 was,, , you will remember the case of, , Nazanin
Zaghari-Ratcliffe, the half Iranian womanwho went to see her, relatives in Tehran
(04:42):
and then was basically held hostage bythe Iranian regime for several years.
And she was a constituent oftulip in Hampstead and Highgate,
or Hampstead and Kilburn at theconstituent was, originally called.
Tulip campaigned very hardNoticeably for Nazanin's release,
(05:03):
which was all very commendable.
But, when journalists asked her,there are some human rights, issues in
Bangladesh associated with your Aunt: disappearances, illegal detentions. (05:14):
undefined
extra judicial killings, dissidentsbeing locked up and the key thrown away.
she was particularly asked abouta man called em a lawyer and she
said, I don't know anything about I.
About that.
(05:34):
and it led, one, fortnightlymagazine to, say at the time well.
it appears that she's not asgood an actress as one of her
predecessors as the MP for Hampsteadand Highgate, IE Glenda Jackson,
Helen (05:51):
Mother of Dan Hodges.
Just as to bring in one of myfavourite political journalism facts!
Andy (05:56):
It's extraordinary looking back and seeing.
So what that's nine years ago nowwas the first piece about tulip
Siddiq in the eye, identifying the.
difficulty of someone whose auntis running Bangladesh, the state,
which is, detaining, disappearing,people having them killed.
The details are really grizzlyof people who, half the people
detained as, as bad as it comes.
(06:16):
Yeah, Half of them might turn upagain, after some years later.
The other half wouldn't.
some of them might even be alive.
what is it that makesthis story blow up now?
Probably the fact that she's beenmade the anti-corruption minister,
which is, that's a pretty effectiveway of, bringing it up again.
Tim (06:31):
it's gained momentum in the last few months because Sheikh...
Auntie Hasina, has been overthrown.
Yeah.
in a, a, rebellion led by, by students.
And now we have, hopefully honestgovernment in charge in Bangladesh.
They're saying, we want our money back.
And, they're, highlightingwhere has this gone?
Adam (06:54):
it is led by an opposition leader who also was given a 17 year
prison sentence for corruption.
and spent quite a long timeon the house arrest before she
came back to leave the country.
they, do their politics inquite a, full on way there.
Whoever isn't in power does tend tobe under arrest at any given time.
Helen (07:08):
But this is a, all of this stuff makes me think about how much
we require kind of oppositionalpolitics and why totalitarian systems
are inherently much more corrupt.
Because one of the ways that thesethings become a scandal is because they
get stuck to the government of the timeby the opposition of the time, right?
And those two things reverse with thegreat swell of nature back and forward.
Or something gets politicized.
(07:29):
And although that's usuallyused as a pejorative in many
cases, that means that means.
A group of people care aboutit because they think they can
use it to wound the government.
that's how these kind, these things kindof work, is that people who are in power
are never going to investigate themselves.
So in a functional democracy, boththe opposition and the press to some
extent act as the, checks on that.
(07:49):
But I think with all of these scandals,the people who've been promoting them
often are the political opponents.
And that's, again, that'sa slightly unpleasant, but,
inevitable part of the process.
Andy (07:59):
Okay, so it's fine then.
Helen (08:01):
yes.
Everything that's happened inthe world up to date, I'm okay
with just to put that on record.
Andy (08:06):
No, but I see what you mean about the necessity of the slightly
unpleasant necessity of that, orthe inevitability of it rather.
Helen (08:11):
Yeah, I think, I, going back to this a lot, but I think it was very
interesting the way that David Camerondidn't see the referendum bludgeoning he
got coming because he'd been used to avery friendly press environment and then
suddenly a lot of the right wing papers.
Didn't treat him as beloved Toryleader, David Cameron, but leader of
hated remain campaign, David Cameron.
Andy (08:29):
And
Helen (08:29):
so that, that process is, yeah.
As I say, we often talk about thatas if it's that, oh no, you've
made a, you've politicized this.
it's often said after someterrible gun massacre in America
don't politicize a t tragedy.
But realistically, politicizingtragedies is the only way that
anything gets done about them.
Andy (08:43):
Tim, can I ask you, Do you think the Labour leadership don't read private eye?
We should send them a subscription.
Shouldn't we?
Likes a freebies?
Helen (08:56):
I just want to know Tulip Siddiq thinks she got given the house for.
Yes.
In what is your, likerationale to yourself?
Where, oh, that's very kind.
Thank you.
I've always wanted a house.
How did You know, I just, people needto be a bit more suspicious about
where freebies, like what is thepo, why, how many gen, truly just
generous people there are in the world.
Tim (09:18):
has that worldview, doesn't he?
Yeah.
That he's surrounded by verygenerous people, but, not as
generous as Auntie Hasina chums.
Andy (09:26):
no.
It's beginning to make those glasseslook like a bad bargain, frankly.
right Section two of the podcast now, andthere is one thing I'd like to request
of all of us, which is that we do notin this section, and I'm gonna see if
we actually manage to stick to this,that we do not talk about Elon Musk,
Adam (09:44):
You've just done it, Andy?
Oh no, I, yes.
Penny in the jar.
Come on.
He's been,
Andy (09:50):
you have to pay a billion dollars into the jar for every, mention.
So we are gonna try notto talk about Elon Musk.
I.
Which is gonna be very difficult.
'cause the next year we're gonnatalk about is, grooming gangs and
the radicalization of the British.
, this has been a, anenormous story this year.
of course have seen already ifyou're listening to this podcast.
, and it's a very interestingone because in the old days.
(10:11):
There was a right wing foreign billionairewho everyone kow to, and he was
called Rupert Murdoch and it was fine.
Things have slightly changed when thebillionaire in question has their own,
Twitter account and is putting outextraordinary amounts of, quite far.
Stuff from quite random accounts,which may not have been completely
on it with their fact checking.
Helen (10:30):
Actually, Rupert Murdoch in many ways is the hero of this
story because it was his funding.
No, it was the London Times under AndrewNorfolk and at the time edited by James
Harding that published, one of the frontpages was a Nation shame with the pictures
of all the perpetrators and Andrew Norfolkhad to work incredibly hard in the face
of, I'm sure stuff that we'll talk about.
All the stuff that Tim deals with on adaily basis of councils being deliberately
obstructive and throwing absolutelyanything at the, to stop reporting.
(10:53):
yeah, I'm afraid update regarding.
Billionaire, Rupert Murdoch.
Turns out billionairescould be a lot worse.
Also,
Andy (11:00):
you can tell that Helen also writes for a, an atlanticist publication.
By the way, she says The LondonTimes, I just wanted point that out.
Sorry.
We call it The Times here, Helen.
Oh God.
The actual, oh no,
Adam (11:12):
I forgot.
See that?
That's one other thing.
we.
Pointed this out in the last edition.
You wrote piece pointingout that Andrew Norfolk.
he got the, Paul Foot Award forinvestigative and campaigning journalism
right back in 2012 for this, and it wasvery much a campaign, but part of the
tone of that campaign was that issuehad been ignored and had been covered up
because of concerns about councils and,various people being seen as racists.
So it's not even that's a new elementto this story that's been added on.
(11:34):
Now it's all been very, much partof the narrative, right from.
From the outset
Andy (11:38):
So in terms of the initial element of the story, we'll, get to the reaction
later, but I think in terms of the actual.
Story about should therebe a new inquiry into this?
Tim, you, deal a lot with rottenboroughs do you have any knowledge of.
whether council inquiries areautomatically a good thing or whether
they are always, going to be secondfiddle to a big national inquiry.
, Tim (12:02):
there was the, National inquiry into child sex abuse,
which concluded two or three yearsago, which included this issue.
There was a section on this issueand, Alexis j who conducted that
made a number of investigations.
, by all means, let individual councils,See what lessons need to be learned.
(12:25):
But I, I personally think that,we, know what was happening.
We know what was going wrong and whatcouncils need to do, and they know
they need to do is put processes inplace so that when this behavior is,
flagged up, something is done about it.
And that social workers and police don't,push it to one side as unfortunately
(12:47):
they did in some cases, not all.
Adam (12:49):
the one good thing that's come out of this sort of recent eruption of
interest in it I think was actually someof, Alexis Jay's recommendations do now
appear to be being in the process ofbeing implemented, which is extraordinary.
ia, I listened back, we did apodcast, you and I were on it.
And Francis, we as well on Jane Mackenzietalking about IA when it was, When it was
the Westminster hearing, back in 2020,
Helen (13:08):
that's the independent inquiry into child sex abuse led.
Yeah.
Which was this great eventually by Jay
Adam (13:11):
overarching.
it took in sort of abuse in churchesand schools and it was enormous
and incredibly comprehensive.
And actually, you can have as manyinvestigations as you want, but if no
one actually acts on the recommendationsof them and does anything about
it, and the other thing that reallystruck me is this whole thing, recent
eruption of interest in this came.
A day or two days after we'd beentold Wes Streeting had announced that
(13:32):
we were having yet another inquiryinto, the issue of, adult social
care, which is another thing we bangedon about endlessly on this podcast.
And that was being that wasuniversally presented as the government
kicking that particular issue downinto the long grass until 2028.
it's gotta be a point.
Hasn't that when you, stop havinginquiries and actually do something,
Andy (13:52):
it's also fairly obvious that it's been picked on as a, stick to
beat Labour with, although given that.
as the, Director of Public Prosecutions,Starmer is quite well informed about
it and made quite a few well-documentedchanges to how these crimes were reported.
It feels like a slightlyodd stick to pick up.
Helen (14:09):
It was a very difficult, Prime Minister's Questions
'cause Kemi Badenoch used.
All of her six questions on itand unfortunately it was like
picking on something that yeah.
Care summary's a world expert on and hewas able to say, like you said, the ICS
of that report, inquiry took seven years.
do I, we really want to haveit wait another seven years.
Were doing anything else about this?
The counterpoint to that is that, I,correct me if I'm wrong, Adam, but it
was like five case studies in, thatreport of different types of abuse, none
(14:33):
of which were an Asian grooming gang.
So that's the complaint that then no onehas really stepped back and looked at
that particular racialized phenomenon,which does have a, I think a, fair.
Point to it as a, question, and Ithink people have been reluctant
to engage with that aspect of it.
Yeah.
But yeah, I, unfortunately, yes.
as DPP Ki Starman, for example,argued for, mandatory reporting,
(14:54):
he was the one who gave the signoff for some of the prosecutions.
So the kind of online speculation thathe's worried about what this is gonna
uncover about him seems to be a flawedassumption that just 'cause he was
near when some of this stuff happened.
Yeah.
That he must be implicated by it.
And then there was, there's been flatout misinformation circulating as well.
So one of the.
Charges is that the home office in 2007circulated a memo saying, this is just
(15:16):
a lifestyle choice for these girls.
Don't do anything about it.
BBC verified spent ages runningdown this piece of information.
Gordon Brand denied it.
He was, it must have been 2008.
He was Prime Minister at the time.
, and it was eventually all came downto the prosecutor in the cases, and
Nazi Al had said it off the cuff in aninterview in 2018 that this memo existed.
He'd never seen it when the BBC went.
Can you tell us a bitmore about this memo?
(15:36):
He couldn't stand it up.
He said his words hadprobably been misinterpreted.
BBC went and looked for any suchmemo with any words, anywhere in
the home office archive, any ofthe FOI requests couldn't find it.
So we've got this systematic problemin which there are some things that
are true in all of this, but they arehappening in the place of this massive
swamp where things are just and youwere, I'm sure there were people.
(15:57):
People out there who'll be surprised tohear that home office memo doesn't exist
because it has almost passed into legend,but it came from one unsourced claim, from
one person speaking a bit too casually.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And that's the informationenvironment that we're in there.
Andy (16:10):
And the other thing is that I think what we need is a massive inquiry
to find out the truth, isn't it?
But there, there's another,so here's an element of, I
didn't really know much about.
So there have been various storiesabout the, racial breakdown of
perpetrators, of the kinds of crime.
, and there was a story inthe Telegraph headline.
Pakistan is up to four times morelikely to be behind grooming.
when you get into the detail ofthat, it turns out that specific.
(16:32):
Offenses of grooming, whichis, specifically child sexual
exploitation by groups.
That accounts for about several hundredoffenses a year, and that is between three
and 4% of recorded abuse of children.
it's obviously hideous.
It needs prosecuting, it needsidentifying, but is a relatively
small piece of the overall.
Picture of, abuse of children.
(16:54):
And in one particular two year periodidentified by the telegraph, Pakistani
men were disproportionately represented.
It was something like 12% of thoseseveral hundred offenses as opposed to
3% of the overall population of the uk.
Now, again, when you get into thestory a bit further, as the telegraphic
acknowledged, this data coversonly about a third of suspects who
(17:14):
were interviewed by police and thepeople behind the program itself,
which released these figures said.
Either Pakistani men are likely to committhis specific offense, or the victims
of these crimes are easier to identify,or it's a statistical sampling quirk.
And it, it remains true that thebiggest threat to a child is someone
within their family or another child.
(17:34):
That's the, the overwhelmingstatistical preponderance that is quite.
Complicated to get across, particularlyin a headline, which is why you end up
with the headline, Pakistan is up to fourtimes more likely to be behind grooming,
that is true of this two year period ofthis particular subsection of offenses.
Tim (17:52):
a colleague of mine on a different publication who was investigating,
these matters some years ago wasgiven a sobering assessment by,
a senior police officer who said,pedophile is a three letter word.
DAD.
We have these outbursts, . Of concernssuch as the one about focusing on
the grooming gangs, the tabloidspromoting the idea that, abusers
(18:17):
are, old men in Dirty Macs whospring out from behind the garage.
and I think our society has a problemin looking at where, as you say, where
most of it is going on, it's in the home.
It's somebody across the street,it's your neighbor, it's somebody
in your family, and as a society, wejust can't get our heads around that.
(18:40):
So look for.
Bogey men elsewhere.
I'm not saying that thegrooming doesn't happen.
Yeah, exactly.
It's, as you say, it's a,relatively small proportion of the
overall rather horrific picture.
Helen (18:54):
'cause you're right, every time you attempt to give some kind
of context to this, it's accused ofbeing the same as your minimizing
your, covering up the grooming gangs.
And I think that's a, that's just a verydifficult thing to try and bat back and
this whole subject has been swallowed bynarrative, but you are exactly right, Tim.
I followed the GisellePeco trial of her husband.
Dominique Peco, who invited upwards of,at least over, were 50 convictions, 50
(19:18):
men in that local area, viral website.
He recruited to rape her while shewas unconscious, and that's just by a
random sampling of people who were inthat vicinity, that many people were
prepared to commit a horrific sex crime.
And there is some sort of odd sadistickind of comfort in saying it's limited.
You know that it mostly happensin these forms that are completely
monstrous and unlawful rather thanalso happening in these ways that
(19:40):
are really banal and unremarkable.
Andy (19:42):
So now should we get onto the reaction online and off, and
particularly in fact, not on TwitterX, but in the pages of, for example,
places like The Telegraph and theTimes, because that has been really
fascinating how they are, they have been.
Can
Adam (19:55):
we say radicalized I think it's really interesting.
This is being presented a lot as aproblem of online and a problem, of,
I'm gonna say his name, Elon Musk.
and, that people are now using,unverified sources online and
believing what they read on Twitter.
But actually, the, horrible phrase,but mainstream media have quite a big
part to play in this as well, and it'sbecome a sort of weird circle whereby.
(20:18):
Twitter was such a useful journalisticresource for so many years.
newspapers have been so paired back tothe Boulogne and the resources they've
got have been, minimized so muchthat a lot of people were relying on.
if it's on Twitter, it becomes a story.
we've done endless bits of clickbaitcorner in, in strip shame, just showing.
How nonsense on a kind of Redditforum or a a, popular tweet thread
(20:39):
gets turned into a story for theDaily Express website and then the
Daily Mirror website and all of this.
But as well, I think it has happened that,certainly in the last week we've seen
very much the editorial line of the DailyTelegraph, which has gone very strange as
a newspaper in the last couple of years.
Ha has just been following this.
And it's not even, Twitter wasnever that mainstream, was it?
It was overrepresented among media people.
(21:00):
And it's not just that Elon Musk isdictating what's going on his own site
that he's bought, it's the, that it, thengoes, feeds into the mainstream media.
It's, then leads the news agenda for days.
the lobby are all asking questions to KiStar and to Kami Bayno about this stuff.
And it, just becomes this sortof vicious circle in that way.
Helen (21:18):
But no, again, to say all of this isn't to say that the grooming
gangs didn't happen or weren't a hugescandal and that there weren't a huge
number of victims who deserved justice.
I just think that I'm finding it veryhard to put aside the sort of spinning
on a dime pivoting opportunism ofwhat I'm seeing in a lot of, this.
Andy (21:36):
Elon Musk would never work for someone who had been accused
of any kind of sexual impropriety.
I think we should put that on the record.
Helen (21:43):
Think there's a couple of things.
One is the structural, decline oflocal news and newspapers generally,
which was always the reason that theypicked up stuff from Twitter, right?
Was that it was just you could reprint19 tweets on a subject and suddenly
you had a news story and then, then youwrite op-eds off it that often are like,
why isn't anybody talking about this?
Which is to me is the kind of lastrefuge of a scandal in op-ed terms.
(22:06):
We need to have a conversation about this.
Okay.
You start it, right?
That's what the column is for.
Yeah.
I've written that column before.
We've all, done it.
But, there's that.
and I think the same thing with the,Charlie Peters from GB News said, he
was the only reporter at one of thesentencings quite recently, and I
think that is a fair criticism thatbread and butter court reporting
that we used to have has been.
(22:26):
massively hollowed out.
So there are other factors going on about,maybe more of the local papers would've
been able to report on this stuff.
Now some of them did really, goodwork, but maybe there could have
been more of that if they'd had anybloody money from the two thousands
onwards because of the internethollowing out their business model.
Andy (22:42):
this is very relevant to your patch, Tim, in terms of councils
and reporting on councils andthe very hard work of reporting.
council meetings, councilprocesses, dodgy councils.
Yeah, that's
Tim (22:52):
really, fallen away.
As I've said on these occasionsbefore, we, do six or seven items
a fortnight out of a possible 200.
, tips and submissions and so forth.
So there's, there are so many storiesout there, waiting to be told, and a lot
of people clearly don't think that theirlocal papers are going to do it for them.
(23:14):
and there are honorable exceptions,but cer certainly nothing like it was.
20 years ago.
Adam (23:21):
And not only their individual stories, but if you were going, trying
to spot a pattern in specific townslike Aldermore, Rotham, if you had
a full-time court reporter who wascovering a lot of trials of this kind
and putting, joining the dots together.
but if you can't afford to putanyone in a courtroom to report
on what's happening, then Yeah.
You don't get a chance to do that, do you?
Helen (23:37):
but there was some interesting polling about
what reform voters look like.
So Nigel Farage's vote.
And I have to say also after praisingupdate, we regard, when you say
Andy (23:44):
what they look like, what do you mean?
Helen (23:45):
what their political interests are, or who they are demographically.
And it's one of the things thatthey are like conservative voters.
They do skew much older.
But the difference between them and tovoters is that they are very, online.
They are the people in theFacebook groups that are hearing
this girl was made into a kebab.
In the same way that for along time you would hear online
Gordon Brand sold all the gold.
Or there was a time in the mid 102010s where there was about the
(24:09):
banning ivory became a really bigissue in, in the political campaign.
It was almost not really reported onin the context election campaign, but
it was huge amount of Facebook advertsabout why do they hate the elephants?
that kind of stuff.
These things that circulate online.
There will be community spaces on Facebookand wherever else we, where everybody will
know this fact, whether or not it's trueand it never quite breaches the surface.
(24:31):
And that does correlate quitehighly with, reform voters.
But I was gonna say, not only have Ipraise Rupert murder, I'm also gonna
praise Nigel Farage, who despite havingmade some pretty gross remarks in the
house, one of the things he did dois stand up to an unnamed billionaire
by saying, I will never admit TommyRobinson, he's not right for reform.
I.
And I thought that was a reallyfascinating moment because that
(24:53):
collection of the new online, includingJordan Peterson, my old sparring
partner who is one of Tommy Robinson'sbiggest fans, so much of a big fan
that when he interviewed him on hispodcast, his wife came along as well.
'cause Tammy is such a big fan of yours.
Sorry,
Andy (25:05):
Tammy Peterson.
Tammy, I thought it was TommyRobinson and Tammy Robinson, which
put No, that would be adorable.
Like a sort of be cute folk
Helen (25:10):
couple singing couple.
But anyway, they, there is a, feelingthe American right can, that Tommy
Robinson is a folk hero and he's the onlyone who's ever spoken the truth about
this and he's now a political prisoner.
and the one person who hasn'tbought that narrative is Nigel
Farage, which is why there was that.
Falling out.
Andy (25:28):
is everyone just too online now?
Kimmy bed knocks in her.
I think early mid forties, likeElon Musk is his early mid fifties.
Have these people just beentoo on the internet for 20
years and it's, broken them.
Adam (25:41):
We're kind going back to my solution to everything.
Aren't you switching it offtwo hours in the afternoon.
So we all have to go and playoutside in the fresh air.
Andy (25:48):
Yeah.
And you say on again,
, But I'm not so sure, Adam.
I think we could justlose the password because
Adam (25:52):
we, sorry
Helen (25:53):
everyone,
Andy (25:57):
So now we come to our final section of the show,
which is about David Montgomery.
Beloved question.
Mark
Helen (26:04):
Adam's Muse.
Now for 30 years, so
Adam (26:07):
many,
years ago, as a very callowyoung boy, I came in on work
experience of private lives.
This is October, 1997.
We're talking about, and the veryfirst story I filed was about a
bloke who was in charge of The Mirrorcalled David Rommel Montgomery.
We come to, and here we areall these years later, I'm.
Still writing about it, buthe still hasn't gone away.
Andy (26:25):
The medium of podcasting has been invented in the time you've been covering
Helen (26:28):
Why is his nickname Rommel?
sometimes quite, I knows Ihave his nicknames and he's
just it's too late to ask.
No, his
Tim (26:35):
real name is Montgomery.
Adam (26:37):
you were there, Tim?
because
Tim (26:41):
Montgomery was on our side.
Ah.
See.
And the journalists at TheMirror never, ever felt that Mr.
Montgomery was on their side.
Can I just throw and did you
Adam (26:51):
want a little potted career summary of Dave Montgomery Rommel?
Actually, I'd just like
Andy (26:55):
to say that actually Rommel did a huge amount of good to the Allied War
effort by going back to Berlin for hiswife's birthday, just before the D-Day
landings, because the weather was bad.
And actually Montgomery wascriticized heavily for his
actions in the Normandy campaign.
But we don't have time for that now.
I have to finished.
I've
Helen (27:10):
just, I've become trapped in a room with you, those man talking
about You're not, the rest is history.
Yeah.
The second World War.
I'm just saying.
Andy (27:15):
I'm, there's a case.
There's a case that Roel was on our.
Side too.
All right, I'll move on.
David Rommel Montgomery, has justannounced he's selling off his
National World stable of newspapers.
For those who haven't heardof National World, what is it?
Adam (27:28):
It's not a stable of newspapers.
It was specifically set upas have most of his re his.
His ventures re in recentyears as an investment company.
I'm so sorry.
He just thought that he could,buy up the media and take as much
money out of it for himself and forshareholders as he possibly could.
Okay.
By the way, it does
Andy (27:45):
consist of, it does local consists local newspapers,
Adam (27:47):
largely of local newspapers.
Yeah.
It's, he's he third, no.
Fourth actually go at this.
Montgomery started off as, hewas a chief sub on the mirror.
He worked on a sun back in the eighties,and then he was, he actually edited.
The news of the world, whichseems slightly extraordinary for
a couple of years in the 1980s.
Okay.
and then he was taken off by RupertMurdoch to work for a newspaper
called Today, which for both ofyou are far too young to remember.
(28:09):
But Tim and I, and some of our listenerswill recall was the first full color
newspaper, post today, when today hadbecome yesterday, Rommel moves on again.
He, goes back to the mirror andtakes over as, as Chief Executive
of the Mirror Group after RobertMaxwell has fallen off his yacht.
Unbelievably turns out to bean even worse boss than Robert
Maxwell in many people's views.
He wasn't actually embedding millions fromthe co company like, like Maxwell was.
(28:31):
But he certainly, he sliced the place tothe Boulogne, cut it back horrendously.
And that's the, the model he hasthen followed in all of his other
ventures, which briefly haveincluded a, spell in Germany.
then Local World was a company he setup where he bought up a load of, local
papers that used to belong to NorthCliff Papers, which was the local
paper, bit of the Daily Mail group.
sold them on to Reach afterabout three years after slashing
(28:53):
everything to the Boulogne.
and then he did the same thing withNational World, which he has just.
Breach a deal with before Christmas tosell to, a business associate who, someone
who had already had, a quarter of thecompany, called Media Concierge, which
is just a horrendous name for a, company,but they do own a couple of, newspapers
in Ireland and, have promised in amost, un roly move, to actually invest
(29:16):
in editorial and stop sacking people.
Andy (29:19):
And this is a bit of a, Story about local journalism really.
And again, we're coming back to whatwe were talking about before with local
reporting of whether it's of councils orscandals or crimes or that sort of thing.
and if you haven't heard ofNational World, the company, you
will probably have heard of theScotsman or the Yorkshire Post.
Yeah, Those are the two big titles.
Adam (29:35):
We did a story a little while back about The, the Scotsman offices,
which in the older, because everything,it's just a merry-go-round of ownership
of stuff owned by the Barclay brothersfor a long time when they were in their
pomp and so in their pomp, were they,that they built an enormous office
state-of-the-art office right next tothe new Scottish Parliament in holy rude.
Which they called Barclay House, butthen didn't have the funds to keep
(29:58):
that going and it was in a WeWork fora while and now it's above a super
drug in a shopping street in Edinburgh.
What it's about fourpeople and a dog there.
So is that to do with,Montgomery's ownership?
Yes.
His model has always been to slasheverything, but he also seems
to, Tim is the person in the roomwho has actually worked for him.
but I would say, what he has displayedover many years is a sort of pathological
(30:20):
dislike of certainly journalistsand largely journalism as well.
Tim (30:25):
Yes.
It's curious for, he was a graduateof the, former Mirror group Trainee
scheme, which, gave us a number ofluminaries of British journalism such
as Alistair Campbell, me, When heworked on the mirror, when he was in
more lowly positions, he was known asthe cabin boy because of his penchant
(30:48):
for, todying to the bosses, and alwaysbeing in and out of the editor's office.
can I do this for you?
Can I.
Tie your shoelaces,
Helen (30:59):
did, am I right in saying that he, did he, fire you?
Tim (31:02):
I was actually, what we call a casual journalist.
Oh, yeah.
I wa I wasn't on the staff,but, the mirror did use a lot of
casuals and one way of instantlysaving money was, Montgomery
just, locked out all the casuals.
There was no notice.
So this is scores, if not.
in the small hundreds of peoplejust had their livelihood cut off.
(31:26):
There was no negotiation withthe union or anything like that.
And then among the people who weresacked or locked out were people
who were officials in the NUJ.
so I rather foolishly agreed tostep up and became, I think the
chairman of the, MI group branch.
(31:47):
I had.
Given a couple of quotes tonewspapers giving the njs view
on stuff that was going on there.
And, Montgomery didn't like that.
So I was, I was somerly fired.
Adam (32:01):
you weren't the only, private eye figure to be fired either, were you?
Of course, indeed.
Tim (32:06):
Paul foot of this parish used to have a page in the mirror.
And, one week he produced his page and itwas all about the depredations going on.
Helen (32:16):
look in the mirror as a headline for those
Adam (32:17):
over a large picture of the lovely, Roel Montgomery himself.
Yeah.
And,
Helen (32:21):
do you know, I have for years thought that was a picture of Max
Hastings in the seventies, so it'sgood that we finally cleared that up.
Tim (32:27):
yeah, Paul, they weren't going to put up with that.
So Paul, was out and, Montgomery didonce, give his, , view of how industrial
relations should be, conducted.
And he said, if, you have anunruly horse, you beat it with
a plank until it behaves itself.
Adam (32:46):
Just to prove there's nothing new in the world.
He was also involved in, some very earlysort of fake news, when he and, his editor
on the Daily Mirror at the time, Mr.
Piers Morgan, now on YouTube, took aphoto of Dodie and Diana in August, 1997
and adjusted it; so as it would look asif they were about to kiss each other,
when in fact Dodie had been lookingin completely the opposite direction.
(33:07):
And, when people pointed out that thiswas, a bit of a dodgy thing for Piers
Morgan to have done, it emerged thatactually he had not only the approval
of Montgomery, who was his boss andboss of the whole company at that
point, but Montgomery had actuallywritten the headline for it as well.
Oh,
Andy (33:20):
wow.
I'm glad he learnedhis lesson on that one.
That's very good.
Helen (33:23):
I've got something else to say, which is actually Pi Morgan came out of
the recent story quite well as well, andthat he did a show with Jordan Peterson
in which he listed Tommy Robinson'sextensive rap sheet to his biggest fan.
He,
Andy (33:35):
what is your GB news show starting and you just wanna
come clean and say it's on
Helen (33:39):
strong pitch.
I just think 90 Fry has got a lot on,so I could probably be his parliamentary
assistant and take over his GB news slot.
Andy (33:46):
this broadly a good thing for the staff of the national world?
conglomerate.
Sorry.
Investment company.
Adam (33:52):
it's very, the media concierge takeover you mean, forgive me?
Yes, they are making the right noises.
I should say this.
I don't think the sale has been,it was greed before Christmas.
I don't think it'sactually, gone through yet.
Okay.
but, people I have spoken to are.
Cautiously optimistic.
it's quite hard if you're workingparticularly in the local press
at the moment to be optimisticabout anything very much.
(34:14):
reach PLC, one of the great bigrivals have just brought in some
horrendous things, the sort ofpage counts that they're expecting
all journalists to meet, right?
whether they are writing internetclick bait about what happened in.
Strictly last night, or whether they'rewriting, detailed, stories because
they're the health specialist or whatever.
So do you mean to click target stories?
Yeah, no, you've gotta get xhundred thousand, views per story.
(34:39):
so it's not a fun placeto be working at all.
Okay.
Local media,
Andy (34:43):
I was hoping we might be edging, towards a happy ish potentially
ending, but you've, I think you'veput me back in my box on that one.
what next For where next for Rommel?
who knows?
you don't wanna, as I said,
Adam (34:55):
nearly 30 years of reporting.
I'm right.
He's 76.
Okay.
But, also the other big, elephantin the room is the telegraph, which,
endlessly how many, how long havewe been mentioning the sale of the
Telegraph now on these podcasts?
But.
It was all looking a bit dicey.
Dovid Defo, who was, who had hisbid coming in now Pi and maybe
not have the financing for it.
Charles Moore wrote an impassioned,piece in the Telegraph last week saying,
(35:19):
come on, let's, end this hell of usnot knowing who owns us, but paying
tribute to the fine journalism reportingthat was being done by his colleagues.
Gosh, have you read it lately
Helen (35:28):
talking about The Telegraph for so long that I think that the Observer
sale Came up behind it happened.
And that's as far as I understand it all.
Yeah.
there's got
Adam (35:37):
it, it's supposed to be finalized by, March or April I
think So, they're, in a race now.
Whether we'll still be talking aboutthe Telegraph in a year's time, I dunno.
But one of the bidders who is inthere, he's Montgomery, he still
thinks he, he could take over Yeah.
And another newspaper and, and,wreak his reign of terror over it.
So that's some something certainly peopleat The Telegraph are very, nervous about.
Tim (35:58):
Okay.
Just on behalf of the, Depressed, staffon the observer, have to point out it's
not a sale, it's a disposal true that the,Guardian Media Group are not getting any.
Adam (36:09):
In fact, they are actually paying Tous to take it away in one
of the most extraordinary deals ever.
They are putting up 5 million ofthe purchase price to buy their
own newspaper from themselves.
Thank you, Tim.
You can take therepresentative out of the NUJ.
Andy (36:25):
okay.
thank you so much for listeningto this episode of page 94.
you'll be able to find themagazine on all good newsstands
and in fact, deliver to your door.
If you get a private hy for night.co ukthere are subscriptions available and
it's a magnificent magazine coveringall the stuff you've just heard about.
A much, much, more than that.
We will be back in two weeks with anotherepisode of this podcast, and until then.
(36:46):
Go and read the magazine.
I think I've made that point.
Thanks very much for listening and toMatt Hill of Rethink Audio for producing.
Bye for now.
Hi everybody.
Andrew here.
Just a quick pre- Page 94 announcement,potentially a first, I think,
the conversation you're about tohear was recorded in the Private
Eye offices yesterday afternoon.
The first section of yesterday's showwas all about Tulip Siddiq, then the
government's antique corruption ministerwho had been in the news recently
in a not completely favorable way.
(00:26):
Since we recorded that episode just 24hours ago, Siddiq has resigned as the
government's anti-corruption minister.
It's very clear to us that, number10 heard that we were going to be
covering it on this week's Page94 and thought the game's up.
We better roll over now.
So when you hear us talk about Siddiqas the anti-corruption minister in
the present, just try to rephrasethat as the very, very recent past.
(00:49):
But as you're about to hear thingsgo back much further than that,
between Tulip Siddiq and Private Eye.
Maisie (00:54):
Page 94, the Private Eye Podcast
Andy (00:57):
Hello and welcome to another episode of Page 94.
My name is Andrew Hunter Murray, and I'mhere in the Private Eye office with Helen
Lewis, Adam MacQueen and Tim Minogue.
We are here to discuss stories thathave been in the news recently, and
our first one this week is all aboutTulip Siddiq who you may have heard of.
She is the anti-corruption minister, andshe has been in the papers recently quite
(01:18):
a bit because of some rather unorthodoxhousing arrangements she's made.
now you may well know a lot of ministersget a nice residence to live in.
Maybe it's Chequers.
If you're the pm, maybe it's chiefing.
these tend to be owned by the government.
It's a bit rarer for them to be ownedby large Bangladeshi companies, which
have links to your family members.
(01:39):
Nonetheless, that's what'sbeen happening recently.
Tulip Siddiq's aunt is the PM ofBangladesh, or rather she was until
August last year when she was deposed.
Since then, the family have beenaccused of an extraordinary amount
of embezzlement, billions ofpounds, all to do with various
dodgy contracts for nuclear powerstations and that kind of thing.
(02:00):
these accusations have beenleveled and it turns out that
various members of C'S family.
Have been living in extremelynice homes that belong actually
to Bangladeshi companies.
Now, she has denied wrongdoing.
She's referred herself tothe PM's independent advisor
on minister's interests.
But it does remain true that there is asubstantial number of houses that she's
either been given, family members havebeen given, or family members have been
(02:22):
allowed to stay in rent free or connectedto the world of Bangladeshi politics.
So we thought this wouldbe fun to talk about.
And the fact is, Tim Minogue,you were there first.
Tim (02:32):
This would be just over two years ago, under the
headline, ' Travails With My Aunt'.
Well done that chief sub...
we reported that, Tulip's mother,Rehana, IE Auntie Hasina's sister, was
living rent free in a, very agreeableNorth London house, which was owned
(02:54):
by a man called Shaikh Fazlur Rahman,the executive director of Bangladesh's
largest con conglomerate, Beximco.
Beximco had allegedly benefited duringSheikh Hasina's time in office, with debts
written off and being granted exclusiverights to, distribute the AstraZeneca.
(03:15):
vaccine during Covid.
there is clear evidence of, people whowere close to the regime, wealthy people,
shall we say, doing, favors to the family.
And it now turns out that there wereat least six properties, were either
gifted to or rented cheap to Tulipor Tulip's close relatives in London.
(03:38):
It's ironic that she's theanti-corruption minister,
Helen (03:41):
Can I say something that I think is liable safe, which is whether or
not this is proved to be corruption.
I just don't know who thesepeople are who get given houses.
But random people,
I we're not just
Adam (03:50):
talking houses, we are talking luxury houses.
Some of them in the right, inthe center of London, aren't we?
this is, these are millions that worth.
Helen (03:56):
I feel like it was not impossible to foresee that this
might come up again once she wasmade anti-corruption minister.
That's the fi the bit aboutthis story that I find.
Adam (04:04):
Yes, that's the extraordinary thing.
That just seems to be, to me, another caseof Keir Starmer not, even, not spotting
a tiger trap in front of him, actuallysharpening the spikes in the bottom of the
tiger trap laying the leaves over himself.
It just give her a different job.
Isn't these stories are circulated?
Yeah.
Corruption minister.
Yeah.
For corruption, you mean?
Tim (04:22):
Now the, other aspect of it that I think is interesting and that we wrote
about at least as far back as 2016 was,, , you will remember the case of, , Nazanin
Zaghari-Ratcliffe, the half Iranian womanwho went to see her, relatives in Tehran
(04:42):
and then was basically held hostage bythe Iranian regime for several years.
And she was a constituent oftulip in Hampstead and Highgate,
or Hampstead and Kilburn at theconstituent was, originally called.
Tulip campaigned very hardNoticeably for Nazanin's release,
(05:03):
which was all very commendable.
But, when journalists asked her,there are some human rights, issues in
Bangladesh associated with your Aunt: disappearances, illegal detentions. (05:14):
undefined
extra judicial killings, dissidentsbeing locked up and the key thrown away.
she was particularly asked abouta man called em a lawyer and she
said, I don't know anything about I.
About that.
(05:34):
and it led, one, fortnightlymagazine to, say at the time well.
it appears that she's not asgood an actress as one of her
predecessors as the MP for Hampsteadand Highgate, IE Glenda Jackson,
Helen (05:51):
Mother of Dan Hodges.
Just as to bring in one of myfavourite political journalism facts!
Andy (05:56):
It's extraordinary looking back and seeing.
So what that's nine years ago nowwas the first piece about tulip
Siddiq in the eye, identifying the.
difficulty of someone whose auntis running Bangladesh, the state,
which is, detaining, disappearing,people having them killed.
The details are really grizzlyof people who, half the people
detained as, as bad as it comes.
(06:16):
Yeah, Half of them might turn upagain, after some years later.
The other half wouldn't.
some of them might even be alive.
what is it that makesthis story blow up now?
Probably the fact that she's beenmade the anti-corruption minister,
which is, that's a pretty effectiveway of, bringing it up again.
Tim (06:31):
it's gained momentum in the last few months because Sheikh...
Auntie Hasina, has been overthrown.
Yeah.
in a, a, rebellion led by, by students.
And now we have, hopefully honestgovernment in charge in Bangladesh.
They're saying, we want our money back.
And, they're, highlightingwhere has this gone?
Adam (06:54):
it is led by an opposition leader who also was given a 17 year
prison sentence for corruption.
and spent quite a long timeon the house arrest before she
came back to leave the country.
they, do their politics inquite a, full on way there.
Whoever isn't in power does tend tobe under arrest at any given time.
Helen (07:08):
But this is a, all of this stuff makes me think about how much
we require kind of oppositionalpolitics and why totalitarian systems
are inherently much more corrupt.
Because one of the ways that thesethings become a scandal is because they
get stuck to the government of the timeby the opposition of the time, right?
And those two things reverse with thegreat swell of nature back and forward.
Or something gets politicized.
(07:29):
And although that's usuallyused as a pejorative in many
cases, that means that means.
A group of people care aboutit because they think they can
use it to wound the government.
that's how these kind, these things kindof work, is that people who are in power
are never going to investigate themselves.
So in a functional democracy, boththe opposition and the press to some
extent act as the, checks on that.
(07:49):
But I think with all of these scandals,the people who've been promoting them
often are the political opponents.
And that's, again, that'sa slightly unpleasant, but,
inevitable part of the process.
Andy (07:59):
Okay, so it's fine then.
Helen (08:01):
yes.
Everything that's happened inthe world up to date, I'm okay
with just to put that on record.
Andy (08:06):
No, but I see what you mean about the necessity of the slightly
unpleasant necessity of that, orthe inevitability of it rather.
Helen (08:11):
Yeah, I think, I, going back to this a lot, but I think it was very
interesting the way that David Camerondidn't see the referendum bludgeoning he
got coming because he'd been used to avery friendly press environment and then
suddenly a lot of the right wing papers.
Didn't treat him as beloved Toryleader, David Cameron, but leader of
hated remain campaign, David Cameron.
Andy (08:29):
And
Helen (08:29):
so that, that process is, yeah.
As I say, we often talk about thatas if it's that, oh no, you've
made a, you've politicized this.
it's often said after someterrible gun massacre in America
don't politicize a t tragedy.
But realistically, politicizingtragedies is the only way that
anything gets done about them.
Andy (08:43):
Tim, can I ask you, Do you think the Labour leadership don't read private eye?
We should send them a subscription.
Shouldn't we?
Likes a freebies?
Helen (08:56):
I just want to know Tulip Siddiq thinks she got given the house for.
Yes.
In what is your, likerationale to yourself?
Where, oh, that's very kind.
Thank you.
I've always wanted a house.
How did You know, I just, people needto be a bit more suspicious about
where freebies, like what is thepo, why, how many gen, truly just
generous people there are in the world.
Tim (09:18):
has that worldview, doesn't he?
Yeah.
That he's surrounded by verygenerous people, but, not as
generous as Auntie Hasina chums.
Andy (09:26):
no.
It's beginning to make those glasseslook like a bad bargain, frankly.
right Section two of the podcast now, andthere is one thing I'd like to request
of all of us, which is that we do notin this section, and I'm gonna see if
we actually manage to stick to this,that we do not talk about Elon Musk,
Adam (09:44):
You've just done it, Andy?
Oh no, I, yes.
Penny in the jar.
Come on.
He's been,
Andy (09:50):
you have to pay a billion dollars into the jar for every, mention.
So we are gonna try notto talk about Elon Musk.
I.
Which is gonna be very difficult.
'cause the next year we're gonnatalk about is, grooming gangs and
the radicalization of the British.
, this has been a, anenormous story this year.
of course have seen already ifyou're listening to this podcast.
, and it's a very interestingone because in the old days.
(10:11):
There was a right wing foreign billionairewho everyone kow to, and he was
called Rupert Murdoch and it was fine.
Things have slightly changed when thebillionaire in question has their own,
Twitter account and is putting outextraordinary amounts of, quite far.
Stuff from quite random accounts,which may not have been completely
on it with their fact checking.
Helen (10:30):
Actually, Rupert Murdoch in many ways is the hero of this
story because it was his funding.
No, it was the London Times under AndrewNorfolk and at the time edited by James
Harding that published, one of the frontpages was a Nation shame with the pictures
of all the perpetrators and Andrew Norfolkhad to work incredibly hard in the face
of, I'm sure stuff that we'll talk about.
All the stuff that Tim deals with on adaily basis of councils being deliberately
obstructive and throwing absolutelyanything at the, to stop reporting.
(10:53):
yeah, I'm afraid update regarding.
Billionaire, Rupert Murdoch.
Turns out billionairescould be a lot worse.
Also,
Andy (11:00):
you can tell that Helen also writes for a, an atlanticist publication.
By the way, she says The LondonTimes, I just wanted point that out.
Sorry.
We call it The Times here, Helen.
Oh God.
The actual, oh no,
Adam (11:12):
I forgot.
See that?
That's one other thing.
we.
Pointed this out in the last edition.
You wrote piece pointingout that Andrew Norfolk.
he got the, Paul Foot Award forinvestigative and campaigning journalism
right back in 2012 for this, and it wasvery much a campaign, but part of the
tone of that campaign was that issuehad been ignored and had been covered up
because of concerns about councils and,various people being seen as racists.
So it's not even that's a new elementto this story that's been added on.
(11:34):
Now it's all been very, much partof the narrative, right from.
From the outset
Andy (11:38):
So in terms of the initial element of the story, we'll, get to the reaction
later, but I think in terms of the actual.
Story about should therebe a new inquiry into this?
Tim, you, deal a lot with rottenboroughs do you have any knowledge of.
whether council inquiries areautomatically a good thing or whether
they are always, going to be secondfiddle to a big national inquiry.
, Tim (12:02):
there was the, National inquiry into child sex abuse,
which concluded two or three yearsago, which included this issue.
There was a section on this issueand, Alexis j who conducted that
made a number of investigations.
, by all means, let individual councils,See what lessons need to be learned.
(12:25):
But I, I personally think that,we, know what was happening.
We know what was going wrong and whatcouncils need to do, and they know
they need to do is put processes inplace so that when this behavior is,
flagged up, something is done about it.
And that social workers and police don't,push it to one side as unfortunately
(12:47):
they did in some cases, not all.
Adam (12:49):
the one good thing that's come out of this sort of recent eruption of
interest in it I think was actually someof, Alexis Jay's recommendations do now
appear to be being in the process ofbeing implemented, which is extraordinary.
ia, I listened back, we did apodcast, you and I were on it.
And Francis, we as well on Jane Mackenzietalking about IA when it was, When it was
the Westminster hearing, back in 2020,
Helen (13:08):
that's the independent inquiry into child sex abuse led.
Yeah.
Which was this great eventually by Jay
Adam (13:11):
overarching.
it took in sort of abuse in churchesand schools and it was enormous
and incredibly comprehensive.
And actually, you can have as manyinvestigations as you want, but if no
one actually acts on the recommendationsof them and does anything about
it, and the other thing that reallystruck me is this whole thing, recent
eruption of interest in this came.
A day or two days after we'd beentold Wes Streeting had announced that
(13:32):
we were having yet another inquiryinto, the issue of, adult social
care, which is another thing we bangedon about endlessly on this podcast.
And that was being that wasuniversally presented as the government
kicking that particular issue downinto the long grass until 2028.
it's gotta be a point.
Hasn't that when you, stop havinginquiries and actually do something,
Andy (13:52):
it's also fairly obvious that it's been picked on as a, stick to
beat Labour with, although given that.
as the, Director of Public Prosecutions,Starmer is quite well informed about
it and made quite a few well-documentedchanges to how these crimes were reported.
It feels like a slightlyodd stick to pick up.
Helen (14:09):
It was a very difficult, Prime Minister's Questions
'cause Kemi Badenoch used.
All of her six questions on itand unfortunately it was like
picking on something that yeah.
Care summary's a world expert on and hewas able to say, like you said, the ICS
of that report, inquiry took seven years.
do I, we really want to haveit wait another seven years.
Were doing anything else about this?
The counterpoint to that is that, I,correct me if I'm wrong, Adam, but it
was like five case studies in, thatreport of different types of abuse, none
(14:33):
of which were an Asian grooming gang.
So that's the complaint that then no onehas really stepped back and looked at
that particular racialized phenomenon,which does have a, I think a, fair.
Point to it as a, question, and Ithink people have been reluctant
to engage with that aspect of it.
Yeah.
But yeah, I, unfortunately, yes.
as DPP Ki Starman, for example,argued for, mandatory reporting,
(14:54):
he was the one who gave the signoff for some of the prosecutions.
So the kind of online speculation thathe's worried about what this is gonna
uncover about him seems to be a flawedassumption that just 'cause he was
near when some of this stuff happened.
Yeah.
That he must be implicated by it.
And then there was, there's been flatout misinformation circulating as well.
So one of the.
Charges is that the home office in 2007circulated a memo saying, this is just
(15:16):
a lifestyle choice for these girls.
Don't do anything about it.
BBC verified spent ages runningdown this piece of information.
Gordon Brand denied it.
He was, it must have been 2008.
He was Prime Minister at the time.
, and it was eventually all came downto the prosecutor in the cases, and
Nazi Al had said it off the cuff in aninterview in 2018 that this memo existed.
He'd never seen it when the BBC went.
Can you tell us a bitmore about this memo?
(15:36):
He couldn't stand it up.
He said his words hadprobably been misinterpreted.
BBC went and looked for any suchmemo with any words, anywhere in
the home office archive, any ofthe FOI requests couldn't find it.
So we've got this systematic problemin which there are some things that
are true in all of this, but they arehappening in the place of this massive
swamp where things are just and youwere, I'm sure there were people.
(15:57):
People out there who'll be surprised tohear that home office memo doesn't exist
because it has almost passed into legend,but it came from one unsourced claim, from
one person speaking a bit too casually.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And that's the informationenvironment that we're in there.
Andy (16:10):
And the other thing is that I think what we need is a massive inquiry
to find out the truth, isn't it?
But there, there's another,so here's an element of, I
didn't really know much about.
So there have been various storiesabout the, racial breakdown of
perpetrators, of the kinds of crime.
, and there was a story inthe Telegraph headline.
Pakistan is up to four times morelikely to be behind grooming.
when you get into the detail ofthat, it turns out that specific.
(16:32):
Offenses of grooming, whichis, specifically child sexual
exploitation by groups.
That accounts for about several hundredoffenses a year, and that is between three
and 4% of recorded abuse of children.
it's obviously hideous.
It needs prosecuting, it needsidentifying, but is a relatively
small piece of the overall.
Picture of, abuse of children.
(16:54):
And in one particular two year periodidentified by the telegraph, Pakistani
men were disproportionately represented.
It was something like 12% of thoseseveral hundred offenses as opposed to
3% of the overall population of the uk.
Now, again, when you get into thestory a bit further, as the telegraphic
acknowledged, this data coversonly about a third of suspects who
(17:14):
were interviewed by police and thepeople behind the program itself,
which released these figures said.
Either Pakistani men are likely to committhis specific offense, or the victims
of these crimes are easier to identify,or it's a statistical sampling quirk.
And it, it remains true that thebiggest threat to a child is someone
within their family or another child.
(17:34):
That's the, the overwhelmingstatistical preponderance that is quite.
Complicated to get across, particularlyin a headline, which is why you end up
with the headline, Pakistan is up to fourtimes more likely to be behind grooming,
that is true of this two year period ofthis particular subsection of offenses.
Tim (17:52):
a colleague of mine on a different publication who was investigating,
these matters some years ago wasgiven a sobering assessment by,
a senior police officer who said,pedophile is a three letter word.
DAD.
We have these outbursts, . Of concernssuch as the one about focusing on
the grooming gangs, the tabloidspromoting the idea that, abusers
(18:17):
are, old men in Dirty Macs whospring out from behind the garage.
and I think our society has a problemin looking at where, as you say, where
most of it is going on, it's in the home.
It's somebody across the street,it's your neighbor, it's somebody
in your family, and as a society, wejust can't get our heads around that.
(18:40):
So look for.
Bogey men elsewhere.
I'm not saying that thegrooming doesn't happen.
Yeah, exactly.
It's, as you say, it's a,relatively small proportion of the
overall rather horrific picture.
Helen (18:54):
'cause you're right, every time you attempt to give some kind
of context to this, it's accused ofbeing the same as your minimizing
your, covering up the grooming gangs.
And I think that's a, that's just a verydifficult thing to try and bat back and
this whole subject has been swallowed bynarrative, but you are exactly right, Tim.
I followed the GisellePeco trial of her husband.
Dominique Peco, who invited upwards of,at least over, were 50 convictions, 50
(19:18):
men in that local area, viral website.
He recruited to rape her while shewas unconscious, and that's just by a
random sampling of people who were inthat vicinity, that many people were
prepared to commit a horrific sex crime.
And there is some sort of odd sadistickind of comfort in saying it's limited.
You know that it mostly happensin these forms that are completely
monstrous and unlawful rather thanalso happening in these ways that
(19:40):
are really banal and unremarkable.
Andy (19:42):
So now should we get onto the reaction online and off, and
particularly in fact, not on TwitterX, but in the pages of, for example,
places like The Telegraph and theTimes, because that has been really
fascinating how they are, they have been.
Can
Adam (19:55):
we say radicalized I think it's really interesting.
This is being presented a lot as aproblem of online and a problem, of,
I'm gonna say his name, Elon Musk.
and, that people are now using,unverified sources online and
believing what they read on Twitter.
But actually, the, horrible phrase,but mainstream media have quite a big
part to play in this as well, and it'sbecome a sort of weird circle whereby.
(20:18):
Twitter was such a useful journalisticresource for so many years.
newspapers have been so paired back tothe Boulogne and the resources they've
got have been, minimized so muchthat a lot of people were relying on.
if it's on Twitter, it becomes a story.
we've done endless bits of clickbaitcorner in, in strip shame, just showing.
How nonsense on a kind of Redditforum or a a, popular tweet thread
(20:39):
gets turned into a story for theDaily Express website and then the
Daily Mirror website and all of this.
But as well, I think it has happened that,certainly in the last week we've seen
very much the editorial line of the DailyTelegraph, which has gone very strange as
a newspaper in the last couple of years.
Ha has just been following this.
And it's not even, Twitter wasnever that mainstream, was it?
It was overrepresented among media people.
(21:00):
And it's not just that Elon Musk isdictating what's going on his own site
that he's bought, it's the, that it, thengoes, feeds into the mainstream media.
It's, then leads the news agenda for days.
the lobby are all asking questions to KiStar and to Kami Bayno about this stuff.
And it, just becomes this sortof vicious circle in that way.
Helen (21:18):
But no, again, to say all of this isn't to say that the grooming
gangs didn't happen or weren't a hugescandal and that there weren't a huge
number of victims who deserved justice.
I just think that I'm finding it veryhard to put aside the sort of spinning
on a dime pivoting opportunism ofwhat I'm seeing in a lot of, this.
Andy (21:36):
Elon Musk would never work for someone who had been accused
of any kind of sexual impropriety.
I think we should put that on the record.
Helen (21:43):
Think there's a couple of things.
One is the structural, decline oflocal news and newspapers generally,
which was always the reason that theypicked up stuff from Twitter, right?
Was that it was just you could reprint19 tweets on a subject and suddenly
you had a news story and then, then youwrite op-eds off it that often are like,
why isn't anybody talking about this?
Which is to me is the kind of lastrefuge of a scandal in op-ed terms.
(22:06):
We need to have a conversation about this.
Okay.
You start it, right?
That's what the column is for.
Yeah.
I've written that column before.
We've all, done it.
But, there's that.
and I think the same thing with the,Charlie Peters from GB News said, he
was the only reporter at one of thesentencings quite recently, and I
think that is a fair criticism thatbread and butter court reporting
that we used to have has been.
(22:26):
massively hollowed out.
So there are other factors going on about,maybe more of the local papers would've
been able to report on this stuff.
Now some of them did really, goodwork, but maybe there could have
been more of that if they'd had anybloody money from the two thousands
onwards because of the internethollowing out their business model.
Andy (22:42):
this is very relevant to your patch, Tim, in terms of councils
and reporting on councils andthe very hard work of reporting.
council meetings, councilprocesses, dodgy councils.
Yeah, that's
Tim (22:52):
really, fallen away.
As I've said on these occasionsbefore, we, do six or seven items
a fortnight out of a possible 200.
, tips and submissions and so forth.
So there's, there are so many storiesout there, waiting to be told, and a lot
of people clearly don't think that theirlocal papers are going to do it for them.
(23:14):
and there are honorable exceptions,but cer certainly nothing like it was.
20 years ago.
Adam (23:21):
And not only their individual stories, but if you were going, trying
to spot a pattern in specific townslike Aldermore, Rotham, if you had
a full-time court reporter who wascovering a lot of trials of this kind
and putting, joining the dots together.
but if you can't afford to putanyone in a courtroom to report
on what's happening, then Yeah.
You don't get a chance to do that, do you?
Helen (23:37):
but there was some interesting polling about
what reform voters look like.
So Nigel Farage's vote.
And I have to say also after praisingupdate, we regard, when you say
Andy (23:44):
what they look like, what do you mean?
Helen (23:45):
what their political interests are, or who they are demographically.
And it's one of the things thatthey are like conservative voters.
They do skew much older.
But the difference between them and tovoters is that they are very, online.
They are the people in theFacebook groups that are hearing
this girl was made into a kebab.
In the same way that for along time you would hear online
Gordon Brand sold all the gold.
Or there was a time in the mid 102010s where there was about the
(24:09):
banning ivory became a really bigissue in, in the political campaign.
It was almost not really reported onin the context election campaign, but
it was huge amount of Facebook advertsabout why do they hate the elephants?
that kind of stuff.
These things that circulate online.
There will be community spaces on Facebookand wherever else we, where everybody will
know this fact, whether or not it's trueand it never quite breaches the surface.
(24:31):
And that does correlate quitehighly with, reform voters.
But I was gonna say, not only have Ipraise Rupert murder, I'm also gonna
praise Nigel Farage, who despite havingmade some pretty gross remarks in the
house, one of the things he did dois stand up to an unnamed billionaire
by saying, I will never admit TommyRobinson, he's not right for reform.
I.
And I thought that was a reallyfascinating moment because that
(24:53):
collection of the new online, includingJordan Peterson, my old sparring
partner who is one of Tommy Robinson'sbiggest fans, so much of a big fan
that when he interviewed him on hispodcast, his wife came along as well.
'cause Tammy is such a big fan of yours.
Sorry,
Andy (25:05):
Tammy Peterson.
Tammy, I thought it was TommyRobinson and Tammy Robinson, which
put No, that would be adorable.
Like a sort of be cute folk
Helen (25:10):
couple singing couple.
But anyway, they, there is a, feelingthe American right can, that Tommy
Robinson is a folk hero and he's the onlyone who's ever spoken the truth about
this and he's now a political prisoner.
and the one person who hasn'tbought that narrative is Nigel
Farage, which is why there was that.
Falling out.
Andy (25:28):
is everyone just too online now?
Kimmy bed knocks in her.
I think early mid forties, likeElon Musk is his early mid fifties.
Have these people just beentoo on the internet for 20
years and it's, broken them.
Adam (25:41):
We're kind going back to my solution to everything.
Aren't you switching it offtwo hours in the afternoon.
So we all have to go and playoutside in the fresh air.
Andy (25:48):
Yeah.
And you say on again,
, But I'm not so sure, Adam.
I think we could justlose the password because
Adam (25:52):
we, sorry
Helen (25:53):
everyone,
Andy (25:57):
So now we come to our final section of the show,
which is about David Montgomery.
Beloved question.
Mark
Helen (26:04):
Adam's Muse.
Now for 30 years, so
Adam (26:07):
many,
years ago, as a very callowyoung boy, I came in on work
experience of private lives.
This is October, 1997.
We're talking about, and the veryfirst story I filed was about a
bloke who was in charge of The Mirrorcalled David Rommel Montgomery.
We come to, and here we areall these years later, I'm.
Still writing about it, buthe still hasn't gone away.
Andy (26:25):
The medium of podcasting has been invented in the time you've been covering
Helen (26:28):
Why is his nickname Rommel?
sometimes quite, I knows Ihave his nicknames and he's
just it's too late to ask.
No, his
Tim (26:35):
real name is Montgomery.
Adam (26:37):
you were there, Tim?
because
Tim (26:41):
Montgomery was on our side.
Ah.
See.
And the journalists at TheMirror never, ever felt that Mr.
Montgomery was on their side.
Can I just throw and did you
Adam (26:51):
want a little potted career summary of Dave Montgomery Rommel?
Actually, I'd just like
Andy (26:55):
to say that actually Rommel did a huge amount of good to the Allied War
effort by going back to Berlin for hiswife's birthday, just before the D-Day
landings, because the weather was bad.
And actually Montgomery wascriticized heavily for his
actions in the Normandy campaign.
But we don't have time for that now.
I have to finished.
I've
Helen (27:10):
just, I've become trapped in a room with you, those man talking
about You're not, the rest is history.
Yeah.
The second World War.
I'm just saying.
Andy (27:15):
I'm, there's a case.
There's a case that Roel was on our.
Side too.
All right, I'll move on.
David Rommel Montgomery, has justannounced he's selling off his
National World stable of newspapers.
For those who haven't heardof National World, what is it?
Adam (27:28):
It's not a stable of newspapers.
It was specifically set upas have most of his re his.
His ventures re in recentyears as an investment company.
I'm so sorry.
He just thought that he could,buy up the media and take as much
money out of it for himself and forshareholders as he possibly could.
Okay.
By the way, it does
Andy (27:45):
consist of, it does local consists local newspapers,
Adam (27:47):
largely of local newspapers.
Yeah.
It's, he's he third, no.
Fourth actually go at this.
Montgomery started off as, hewas a chief sub on the mirror.
He worked on a sun back in the eighties,and then he was, he actually edited.
The news of the world, whichseems slightly extraordinary for
a couple of years in the 1980s.
Okay.
and then he was taken off by RupertMurdoch to work for a newspaper
called Today, which for both ofyou are far too young to remember.
(28:09):
But Tim and I, and some of our listenerswill recall was the first full color
newspaper, post today, when today hadbecome yesterday, Rommel moves on again.
He, goes back to the mirror andtakes over as, as Chief Executive
of the Mirror Group after RobertMaxwell has fallen off his yacht.
Unbelievably turns out to bean even worse boss than Robert
Maxwell in many people's views.
He wasn't actually embedding millions fromthe co company like, like Maxwell was.
(28:31):
But he certainly, he sliced the place tothe Boulogne, cut it back horrendously.
And that's the, the model he hasthen followed in all of his other
ventures, which briefly haveincluded a, spell in Germany.
then Local World was a company he setup where he bought up a load of, local
papers that used to belong to NorthCliff Papers, which was the local
paper, bit of the Daily Mail group.
sold them on to Reach afterabout three years after slashing
(28:53):
everything to the Boulogne.
and then he did the same thing withNational World, which he has just.
Breach a deal with before Christmas tosell to, a business associate who, someone
who had already had, a quarter of thecompany, called Media Concierge, which
is just a horrendous name for a, company,but they do own a couple of, newspapers
in Ireland and, have promised in amost, un roly move, to actually invest
(29:16):
in editorial and stop sacking people.
Andy (29:19):
And this is a bit of a, Story about local journalism really.
And again, we're coming back to whatwe were talking about before with local
reporting of whether it's of councils orscandals or crimes or that sort of thing.
and if you haven't heard ofNational World, the company, you
will probably have heard of theScotsman or the Yorkshire Post.
Yeah, Those are the two big titles.
Adam (29:35):
We did a story a little while back about The, the Scotsman offices,
which in the older, because everything,it's just a merry-go-round of ownership
of stuff owned by the Barclay brothersfor a long time when they were in their
pomp and so in their pomp, were they,that they built an enormous office
state-of-the-art office right next tothe new Scottish Parliament in holy rude.
Which they called Barclay House, butthen didn't have the funds to keep
(29:58):
that going and it was in a WeWork fora while and now it's above a super
drug in a shopping street in Edinburgh.
What it's about fourpeople and a dog there.
So is that to do with,Montgomery's ownership?
Yes.
His model has always been to slasheverything, but he also seems
to, Tim is the person in the roomwho has actually worked for him.
but I would say, what he has displayedover many years is a sort of pathological
(30:20):
dislike of certainly journalistsand largely journalism as well.
Tim (30:25):
Yes.
It's curious for, he was a graduateof the, former Mirror group Trainee
scheme, which, gave us a number ofluminaries of British journalism such
as Alistair Campbell, me, When heworked on the mirror, when he was in
more lowly positions, he was known asthe cabin boy because of his penchant
(30:48):
for, todying to the bosses, and alwaysbeing in and out of the editor's office.
can I do this for you?
Can I.
Tie your shoelaces,
Helen (30:59):
did, am I right in saying that he, did he, fire you?
Tim (31:02):
I was actually, what we call a casual journalist.
Oh, yeah.
I wa I wasn't on the staff,but, the mirror did use a lot of
casuals and one way of instantlysaving money was, Montgomery
just, locked out all the casuals.
There was no notice.
So this is scores, if not.
in the small hundreds of peoplejust had their livelihood cut off.
(31:26):
There was no negotiation withthe union or anything like that.
And then among the people who weresacked or locked out were people
who were officials in the NUJ.
so I rather foolishly agreed tostep up and became, I think the
chairman of the, MI group branch.
(31:47):
I had.
Given a couple of quotes tonewspapers giving the njs view
on stuff that was going on there.
And, Montgomery didn't like that.
So I was, I was somerly fired.
Adam (32:01):
you weren't the only, private eye figure to be fired either, were you?
Of course, indeed.
Tim (32:06):
Paul foot of this parish used to have a page in the mirror.
And, one week he produced his page and itwas all about the depredations going on.
Helen (32:16):
look in the mirror as a headline for those
Adam (32:17):
over a large picture of the lovely, Roel Montgomery himself.
Yeah.
And,
Helen (32:21):
do you know, I have for years thought that was a picture of Max
Hastings in the seventies, so it'sgood that we finally cleared that up.
Tim (32:27):
yeah, Paul, they weren't going to put up with that.
So Paul, was out and, Montgomery didonce, give his, , view of how industrial
relations should be, conducted.
And he said, if, you have anunruly horse, you beat it with
a plank until it behaves itself.
Adam (32:46):
Just to prove there's nothing new in the world.
He was also involved in, some very earlysort of fake news, when he and, his editor
on the Daily Mirror at the time, Mr.
Piers Morgan, now on YouTube, took aphoto of Dodie and Diana in August, 1997
and adjusted it; so as it would look asif they were about to kiss each other,
when in fact Dodie had been lookingin completely the opposite direction.
(33:07):
And, when people pointed out that thiswas, a bit of a dodgy thing for Piers
Morgan to have done, it emerged thatactually he had not only the approval
of Montgomery, who was his boss andboss of the whole company at that
point, but Montgomery had actuallywritten the headline for it as well.
Oh,
Andy (33:20):
wow.
I'm glad he learnedhis lesson on that one.
That's very good.
Helen (33:23):
I've got something else to say, which is actually Pi Morgan came out of
the recent story quite well as well, andthat he did a show with Jordan Peterson
in which he listed Tommy Robinson'sextensive rap sheet to his biggest fan.
He,
Andy (33:35):
what is your GB news show starting and you just wanna
come clean and say it's on
Helen (33:39):
strong pitch.
I just think 90 Fry has got a lot on,so I could probably be his parliamentary
assistant and take over his GB news slot.
Andy (33:46):
this broadly a good thing for the staff of the national world?
conglomerate.
Sorry.
Investment company.
Adam (33:52):
it's very, the media concierge takeover you mean, forgive me?
Yes, they are making the right noises.
I should say this.
I don't think the sale has been,it was greed before Christmas.
I don't think it'sactually, gone through yet.
Okay.
but, people I have spoken to are.
Cautiously optimistic.
it's quite hard if you're workingparticularly in the local press
at the moment to be optimisticabout anything very much.
(34:14):
reach PLC, one of the great bigrivals have just brought in some
horrendous things, the sort ofpage counts that they're expecting
all journalists to meet, right?
whether they are writing internetclick bait about what happened in.
Strictly last night, or whether they'rewriting, detailed, stories because
they're the health specialist or whatever.
So do you mean to click target stories?
Yeah, no, you've gotta get xhundred thousand, views per story.
(34:39):
so it's not a fun placeto be working at all.
Okay.
Local media,
Andy (34:43):
I was hoping we might be edging, towards a happy ish potentially
ending, but you've, I think you'veput me back in my box on that one.
what next For where next for Rommel?
who knows?
you don't wanna, as I said,
Adam (34:55):
nearly 30 years of reporting.
I'm right.
He's 76.
Okay.
But, also the other big, elephantin the room is the telegraph, which,
endlessly how many, how long havewe been mentioning the sale of the
Telegraph now on these podcasts?
But.
It was all looking a bit dicey.
Dovid Defo, who was, who had hisbid coming in now Pi and maybe
not have the financing for it.
Charles Moore wrote an impassioned,piece in the Telegraph last week saying,
(35:19):
come on, let's, end this hell of usnot knowing who owns us, but paying
tribute to the fine journalism reportingthat was being done by his colleagues.
Gosh, have you read it lately
Helen (35:28):
talking about The Telegraph for so long that I think that the Observer
sale Came up behind it happened.
And that's as far as I understand it all.
Yeah.
there's got
Adam (35:37):
it, it's supposed to be finalized by, March or April I
think So, they're, in a race now.
Whether we'll still be talking aboutthe Telegraph in a year's time, I dunno.
But one of the bidders who is inthere, he's Montgomery, he still
thinks he, he could take over Yeah.
And another newspaper and, and,wreak his reign of terror over it.
So that's some something certainly peopleat The Telegraph are very, nervous about.
Tim (35:58):
Okay.
Just on behalf of the, Depressed, staffon the observer, have to point out it's
not a sale, it's a disposal true that the,Guardian Media Group are not getting any.
Adam (36:09):
In fact, they are actually paying Tous to take it away in one
of the most extraordinary deals ever.
They are putting up 5 million ofthe purchase price to buy their
own newspaper from themselves.
Thank you, Tim.
You can take therepresentative out of the NUJ.
Andy (36:25):
okay.
thank you so much for listeningto this episode of page 94.
you'll be able to find themagazine on all good newsstands
and in fact, deliver to your door.
If you get a private hy for night.co ukthere are subscriptions available and
it's a magnificent magazine coveringall the stuff you've just heard about.
A much, much, more than that.
We will be back in two weeks with anotherepisode of this podcast, and until then.
(36:46):
Go and read the magazine.
I think I've made that point.
Thanks very much for listening and toMatt Hill of Rethink Audio for producing.
Bye for now.
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