welcome to Sputnik orbiting the world
with me George Galloway and me gayathri
if Britain had a legion of honor like
France our first guest would be in the
front ranks of it instead we've had to
make him a lot which is a pretty poor
substitute I can tell you he has
literally risen from homelessness in the
streets to being the Baron birth of
nothing hill in between he founded the
big issue which has just published its
1230 fifth issue selling 250 million
copies over 25 years he speaks out with
no fear or favour on all kinds of issues
but homelessness and poverty remains his
number one concern he is Lord John BIRT
MBE Lord burn thanks for joining us on
these but Nick I could speak to you all
day but we've only got 11 and a half
minutes so you learned to read and write
in a boy's prison you are homeless
several times you were brought up by
nuns and you ended up in the House of
Lords it's quite a Christmas story
actually but what are the mean morals
you draw from that story well I think
the interesting thing for me is that I
did everything conceivably wrong and my
parents did everything conceivably wrong
but occasionally I would run into people
who helped to change my life the fact
that I was a Catholic the fact that I
believed in Jesus was a great Savior the
fact that i became a marxist in my early
20s and i got rid of all my
anti-semitism and auntie you know racism
which i had inherited from my London
Irish background the fact that I was
always a strong believer in the fact
that human beings could do better
because I was gradually morphing my way
out of the underclass the criminal
classes and as I was going along I was
meeting people who were worth knowing
and
so I I'm really a person who owes it all
to luck in fact my autobiography I
wanted to call it I Bonaparte this is
for penguin because I have delusions of
grandeur and I still do ah but they
wouldn't let me do it in case in case of
Bonaparte has got the book it wrong and
you know and all that stuff so I call it
some luck and I've had incredible luck I
mean you imagine at the age of 12 call
it luck I call it divine intervention
myself yeah well divine intervention
which is sometimes called looked when I
was 21 I was hiding from the old bill in
edinburgh and i met this ugly big no
Scotsman call Gordon Roddick Who am and
I nearly had a fight because i had a
nose like there any other nope like that
and we became mates and then I didn't
see him for 20 years and he'd morphed
into a multi-millionaire he had become
the founder of the body shop with his
wife and its erotic and I thought I
bless myself i thought god I've got to
go and see him and we became mates again
he was in New York in 1990 met some guy
selling a street paper and the guy out
so Gordon such an why you selling it he
says well I make money I come from
Brownsville you don't get out of there
unless you know web Tyson comes from
I've been in and out the penitentiary
system for most of my life I now want to
go I want to see my children so he was
selling the street paper called Street
news which was brilliant Gordon comes
back to the UK tries to get the homeless
organizations to to create a three paper
but the problem with them
but that they were already doing that
and doing that and robbing your granny
to do it never occurred to them so
eventually asked me to do it as an
ex-offender and a rough sleeper as a
beggar one of Britain's best burgers I
could I could win a prize for that I'm
all the sorts of stuff so that's luck on
divine intervention that is brilliant
making the most of my big broken nose
his big broken nose and us becoming
inseparable friends and me because my
mother had me begging for money as a
child on poor Bella road to get money
for her cigarettes I never had any
problem of asking people for money I'm
great if I meet some there's no way I've
been sleeping in the streets now because
I'd be poncing off somebody and getting
some money and I was really determined
to get a big chunk of this guy's money
to create the big issue and to make it
work for the most disenfranchised people
operating in Britain now you're a parent
and you're sitting amongst all these
other barons traditionally of course
these people became balanced by by
cutting other people's throats and and
stealing off them do you feel that
you're actually one of the few noble
people in dynasty well you see all right
in defense I couldn't offer any defense
without the comments I couldn't but I
can offer defense for the House of Lords
because in spite of the fact there are
some people time servers and
who had started in engineering and
worked as he became the professor of
engineering at our Cambridge University
I another person was a nurse you come
from a council flat who became a head
nurse who ended up running a health
school in these in the West End in the
west of the country I came in with
people who like me as a cross bencher
not appointed by any political party who
came in as experts because the problem
is the government sends this legislation
it's like a barge they send it from one
part of the Palace of Westminster and
they send you a leaky barge and it
arrives there and you're supposed to
jump on it give it an MOT do this than
the other and you look at it and you
realize how appalling most government
legislation is why because my fellow
lords who were active look at this table
this doesn't work this doesn't work and
then we send it back we modernize it
sometimes we make it work but the real
thing is that there are expertise in the
house applause you don't get that in the
beauty show the you know the kind of X
Factor places and well once upon a time
you did there's not much expertise there
I don't know I'll grant you I want to
ask you about what no for the big issue
and what no for the other causes that
you're involved in well you see the
other thing I get into the house of
lords and I realized that seventy
percent of our activity is about what's
gone wrong with regard to poverty
intervention what's gone wrong with
government policies what's gone wrong
with charities what's gone wrong with
individuals putting money
here as a way of sorting out the
problems of capitalism which is unable
to answer the problems of poverty and
this is in the fifth largest economy in
the world when I look at that I think
hang on they're getting it wrong then I
realize of course that virtually all of
my fellows are absolutely obsessed with
how bad it is for the poor to live today
and I'm saying do I join them or do I
step back and say so people come to me
and say will you get involved in this
and I say no no I'm here to dismantle
poverty I want to stop Johnny who's 3
who's about to fail at school who is
going to end up leaving school without
any degrees any levels or anything like
that becoming a big issue vendor in 20
years time so I'm there to say you look
after today I really believe that the
big issue in facing us is how do we
dismantle poverty when you look at
government departments when you look at
the fact my own favorite department of
prison department I was educated by the
prison's I was I went to school of into
a good Catholic school god bless them by
the end of it I knew you know the shoe
sizes of disease of the saints but I
didn't know where the world was so when
I learnt to read them right in a boy's
prison that's what that's what reform
was so if we are going to rip we're
going to change poverty we've got to
stop the thirty percent of people who
fail at school becoming eighty percent
of the prison population becoming the
long-term unemployed becoming the people
so we've got to really sort out the kids
at the school but we've got to make
presents work and when you say that
people got all the Liberals recoil I say
look it's the last it was my last chance
it was my University look at the sales
process now there's a lot of liberals in
the political system in the media
they'll always cry over the state of the
NHS or state of social care or or even
homelessness for that matter there's a
wealth of people concerned with that
there doesn't seem to be on the left as
you used to be and I still AM any
believable strategy for generating
wealth for putting people to work
productively I always say under
socialism if I was running it there
would be nobody out of work I mean the
work will be brought to you if you
couldn't get out of your house because
everybody needs to work and not just for
purposes of productivity in other words
what I'm saying is isn't part of this
problem liberalism and liberals
themselves you see what I think the left
is really lost I consider myself still
over the left but I'm I describe myself
as a Catholic Marxist because I want to
separate myself from any kind of social
democracy type thing but the but what I
find is that what is really lacking is a
passion to turn people's lives around so
when I for instance talk about why don't
we turn Social Security into social
opportunity what people say are yeah but
people should be allowed to be who they
are I said no you know what you're doing
is if you live in poverty you live
nowhere near democracy my mother London
Irish lady came over here having all
these children never participated in
democracy never had any time because she
was swallowed up with a night job quiet
leaning in Baker Street and all sorts of
stuff like she never went anywhere so
what we've got to do is we have to come
up on the left on the center where ever
you want to call it we have to come up
with a grand plan now i agree with
Napoleon Napoleon said the most useless
thing on earth is a battle plan but you
lost without it and I believe that we
need to be grand planning we need to be
reinvigorating the original welfare
state you know the original work first
day and I remember I was too when when I
was
five when I went to school people
started I went to school and the first
thing they did with exercises pale
working classes would be as healthy as
the middle classes and fifty years later
sixty years later we have a situation
where we don't spend we spend half of
one percent of the National Health
Service on prevention when we used to
spend twenty percent everything's gone
mercy and I believe very strongly we
need to go back and reinvent what the
welfare state was because it was the
most profound intervention in the light
of ordinary people you are a very
unordinary man and a very unordinary
lord and it's been a pleasure talking to
you on the Sputnik today coming up next
the opposition wins in Ghana and will
take power without a shot being fired
stage welcome back to Sputnik Ghana at
the time of independence from Britain
was led by one of the greatest of all
African leaders Kwame Nkrumah since then
it's been frankly downhill at least in
my opinion although I did have a soft
spot for the half a Scotsman Jerry
Rawlings but you've got to hand it to
Ghana they do generally have free and
fair elections and nobody has to fight
their way into power and the same has
just happened last week as the
opposition leader nana akuffo addo takes
on the Premiership joining us now to
discuss what it all means is jonathan
ave answer founder and publisher of
africa briefing jonathan thanks for
joining us you're welcome and first of
all tell me how does gana managed to
have peaceful relatively fair elections
and the opposition takes on the power
and the power leaves without a fight
what's so different about Ghana would
say ivory coast next door Ghana and
historically you know has been a trip
blazer you know in many spheres of
flavor politics economy and so on so
forth okay I mean gonna was a face to
gain independence in a
Saharan Africa you mention him chromoly
right and fast-forward to the mid 80s i
think and i was armada fests to embrace
IMF structural economic reforms right
which actually help to improve the
economy up to a point and again
generally Ghanians and all there being
so many cause you know in calistoga
history and Ghanians covered up I mean
what actually turned the tide also in
Rollins said the kinetics of the nine
and as cuted so for my major muscle
heads of state and by firing squad and
again some businessmen were arrested you
know wept publicly humiliated publicly
and in those days if you had more than
fifty thousand cities began a currency
in your account you have to come an
account for and if you cringe account
properly for the money in your account
sounds quite fair to me we're well but
but is he saw all these and or
cognitively impaired galleons against
the idea of a coup d'etat Daniel got fed
up of colitas so dear brother and again
I like to think that the Kenyan electric
or the canyon public you know it's a bit
post-college becoming a bit politically
much more mature and a bit sophisticated
okay so will prefer to kill their
governments through develop box instead
of some sugah disclosed disgruntled
suitor gelda from Boris ticking arms and
were throwing a popular government now
you mentioned the IMF Ghana was for a
time at least can a poster boy for IMF
structural reform I must tell you when I
hear the words I am a structural reform
I run for the hills because whilst on
the theoretical level that might improve
some features of the economy it
generally means mass poverty for the
working people and the already poor poor
what comes
Comfort yes so how has or did they ghana
escaped that fate for the masses well
after a while I mean the economy
improved I mean we went through those
reforms Colombia fall from 1983 so I
think delete the mid to late 90s right
and thankfully commodity quality prize
money shut up and again the structure I
just I just met you know took effect
okay so we went off and all those
economic am fe pulls a chronic a
policies and when could flow came to
power in two thousand where he declared
that a hypocrite episode organized debts
no were rich enough okay and a lot of
money started flowing in and Koufos
pro-business so he attracted a lot of
goodwill ok so I'm that actually helped
improved the plight of the ordinary
Ghanaian poverty was reduced from I
think am I think 40 there are about
peasants to under thirty percent okay
and that trend is ongoing now continuing
and so why did the opposition win this
election what were their main criticisms
of the then government or this incumbent
are going away to minister out why were
they defeated okay number one this
ongoing government undertook a lot of
infrastructure big tickets
infrastructure programs and all built
roads hospitals schools so forth there
must be given credit for that but there
is this perception of corruption and
corruption with impunity right so that
actually I wasn't gonna forget September
and just about anybody I spoke to was
crying corruption corruption corruption
and the situation was it helped with the
attracted energy crisis that affected
individuals businesses you know Samba
tens how to close it into every
treatment there for high unemployment
the institution what they have when the
former pres delhi presidents are tamils
they were you taken a lot of strikes by
the purpose of Vanessa's doctors TKS as
well so forth right so I mean the
government had to adjust the public's of
this elaborate structure so a wig
increases where I what had across the
board okay so that shut up balloon the
government but yet recurrent back yet
balloon so much so that it was splendid
about sixty-five percent order of the
budget on widget authorities can you do
the maths okay now and it's situation
was exacerbated by falling prices for
Ghana's cooperating exports Coco gold
and literally a moyel so you could help
so the government had to resort to
borrow in a slumber Owen so right now
the debt the debt stands at about sixty
seven percent of ganas gdp now what's
happened to my old comrade Jerry
Rawlings is he out of politics
altogether his family appear to be on
different sides in the elections what's
that all about well you're only running
so everybody knows him to be to be rid
i'll use the word advisedly by wrigley
you know against you know corruption and
he believed also believes that this
current event is a drink events and i
was a full of corrupt officials and he
was also frustrated you know to put it
mildly by the arguing president john
mahama's simile powerless right to do
anything you know about the corruption
in government and in business okay and
again i believe those also so bad blood
between the fed from a facility
inoculate right my brothers I mean mrs.
Rawlings right some sort of run-ins mrs.
Rollins how to form a home party and
contest but I believe or sense
bleh to to water down yo mama and
entities votes but funny enough air
ionically it wasn't the first time she
ran them or not yes the first thing yes
and I only can am the offense daughter
dr. is a little rolling right how does
been elected another NP at an MP in
order latest last week okay on the
ticket of the road are going potty NDC
yeah yeah it is what do they have
serious political ambitions is there a
possibility of the Rollings family in
one form or a law coming back to power
in Ghana and what I here for the
grapevine and I also very good sources
actually mandatory yeah let him they are
plans for one NDC prevented this guy
whose name i already mentioned right to
become the dealer a party and choose run
as daughter dr. seritov Rawlings asked
his running mate so does a plan here
that well information I gather yeah I
mean without knowing any more about it I
wish them very well indeed the state of
Ghana under the incoming government how
much change um look the people are
clamoring for change you know we had
people coming for change in our an
America elsewhere figures become the
buzzword you know in global politics now
okay the aspects jobs and this incoming
president has made some promises one
dumb for every village you know one
factory for every district 1 million
dollars for every district constituency
so the five coaches resistant gana so
talking about giving one wheel on the
list to every closet choice we talked
about 235 million dollars where is a
money gonna come from they are bunking
the new the increment covers are banking
on improved commodity prices gold oil
and cocoa right and again there's one on
your project that is coming on stream I
think it's a 7.1 billion dollars or you
project that is coming Oh seaside beyond
being managed by Italy's any ela right
that's to come on stream early next year
and that's a gas you know project does
also come on stream it in 2018 ok so the
incoming oval is banking economy on
these revenue streams you know what
about these things gold cocoa and oil
here's my prediction the price will rise
on all three of those over the next five
years less also if it does it depressing
wave the present rice all all the best
all the best for Ghana all the best for
Ghana Jonathan thanks very much for
joining us you were on the Sputnik and
now it's your turn to tell us what you
think through the portals of social
media what's rattling gayatri so the big
issue has sold over 250 million copies
which is amazing amazing matt turner
says a newspaper that helps those who
are vulnerable and marginalized while
our broadsheets pretend they don't exist
and agate Okla says John BIRT shows that
media can be a tool for the great good
as well as evil an inspiration here he
is finest catholic i know from Pope
Francis himself well if all the trees
there we here for today which alas means
that's the end of the show but you can
stay in touch with us on social media
through twitter RT underscore sputnik or
on facebook sputnik on russia today it's
goodbye from me go three and four me
george galloway it's been marvelous
[Music]