How much does the EU cost the UK? Plus, dog years
More or Less
BBC
4.6 • 3.7K Ratings
🗓️ 10 May 2013
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Tim Harford makes sense of the numbers being used in the political battle about the UK and its membership of the EU. And, he looks at whether it’s true that more war veterans kill themselves than die in combat ; why you could well be a descendant of Richard III; and what Margaret Thatcher’s funeral really cost. Plus, is it true that one dog year equals seven human years? Tim unveils the More or Less Dogulator.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Just before this BBC podcast gets underway, here's something you may not know. |
| 0:04.7 | My name's Linda Davies and I Commission Podcasts for BBC Sounds. |
| 0:08.5 | As you'd expect, at the BBC we make podcasts of the very highest quality featuring the most knowledgeable experts and genuinely engaging voices. |
| 0:18.0 | What you may not know is that the BBC makes podcasts about all kinds of things like pop stars, |
| 0:24.6 | poltergeist, cricket, and conspiracy theories and that's just a few examples. |
| 0:29.7 | If you'd like to discover something a little bit unexpected, find your next podcast over at BBC Sounds. |
| 0:36.0 | Thank you for downloading more or less from the BBC. |
| 0:40.0 | This is the half hour edition of the programme first broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on the 10th of May 2013. |
| 0:46.6 | Hello and welcome to more or less the programme which smites the dragon of dodgy data with a shining sword of statistical straight talking. |
| 0:55.0 | This week we run our slide rule over military suicide statistics. |
| 0:59.0 | Richard the Third's relatives, and we unveil... the more or less gogulator. |
| 1:15.0 | But first, the UK Independence Party, UKIP, |
| 1:18.8 | once the United Kingdom to withdraw from the European Union. |
| 1:22.2 | That's not the official policy of any of the established |
| 1:24.4 | political parties, but perhaps the voters have other ideas. UKIP made substantial gains in |
| 1:29.7 | recent local elections, winning more than 140 seats and averaging a quarter of the vote in the |
| 1:35.8 | wards where it was standing. |
| 1:38.0 | As with any political battleground, numbers have been pressed into service as weapons. |
| 1:43.4 | A key objection to staying in the EU is the cost. |
| 1:46.8 | It's about 7 billion pounds according to the government's figures, |
| 1:50.1 | or 150 billion pounds according to UKIP |
| 1:53.0 | who taught up the price of things such as extra paperwork for businesses, |
... |
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