“Not Remotely A Corrupt Country”

Inside Briefing with the Institute for Government

Institute for Government

News, Politics, Government

4.6 • 252 Ratings

🗓️ 11 November 2021

⏱️ 39 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

As the Owen Paterson mess unspools to expose Geoffrey Cox’s novel approach to working from home and much more, has the Government set off a multi-polar controversy it can’t control? Did Boris Johnson do himself any favours by refusing to face the Commons in contrition? And how does it play outside Westminster when someone on £80,000 a year claims they needs a second or third job? Our special guest is ROB HUTTON, veteran lobby journalist and now sketchwriter at The Critic. • “What did I make of last week in Parliament? It was objectively hilarious.” – ROB HUTTON • “Rees-Mogg and Mark Spencer had to sit silently on the benches and take their punishment – and that was quite the sight.” – CATH HADDON • “It’s not important to say you’re not a corrupt country. It’s important not to HAVE to say you’re not a corrupt country…” – ROB HUTTON • “If MPs like Geoffrey Cox have time to do all this extra work, why don’t they spend it trying to improve Parliament?” – CATH HADDON • “The fact that Geoffrey Cox had massive outside jobs was known ten days ago and it wasn’t news back then. It is now.” – ROB HUTTON Presented by Hannah White with Cath Haddon and Tim Durrant. Audio production by Alex Rees. Inside Briefing is a Podmasters Production for the IfG. https://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hello and welcome to Inside Briefing, the podcast from the Institute for Government.
0:13.8	I'm Hannah White, the IFG's deputy director and this week the presenter of the podcast.
0:18.5	On the last episode of Inside Briefing, a near seven days ago, we explored how the government's
0:23.5	efforts to block Owen Patterson's suspension from the Commons had ended up with Patterson's
0:27.4	resignation from Parliament, a kicking from all quarters of the press, and a massive U-turn.
0:32.6	So things could only get better for the Prime Minister after that, right?
0:36.3	Well, a week is a long time in politics,
0:38.7	and for Boris Johnson, the last week must have felt like an eternity. The row over MP standards
0:43.9	shows no signs of simmering down. Quite the opposite. So what now for the Common Standards System?
0:49.7	What needs to happen now to restore public trust? And what about the Code governing ministerial
0:53.9	standards?
0:54.8	Why is it taking so long to settle the row about who paid for the Prime Minister's back
0:58.6	refurbishment? And with the whole question of MPs' second jobs all over the front pages,
1:03.5	with Geoffrey Cox, the former Attorney General, facing tricky questions for the month he spent
1:07.8	during the height of the pandemic working as a lawyer in the British Virgin Islands,
1:11.6	we're going to look at what MPs should be able to do for extra earnings and how much that door between politics and lobbying should be revolving.
1:18.6	I've got a brilliant IFG duo with me to make sense of questions which have been taxing the minds of pretty much everyone in and around Parliament.
1:25.6	Kath Hadden, IFG Senior Fellow, an expert on all things constitutional and ministerial, joins us.
1:31.5	Hi, Kath.
1:32.3	Hello, Hannah.
1:33.6	And once again, Tim Durant, our Associate Director and the brains behind last week's very
1:38.0	well-timed IFG Conference on Standards and Ethics is back again.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Institute for Government, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Institute for Government and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.