TRIGGERnometry - Lord Nigel Lawson：＂I've Never Been More Worried About This Country＂

00:00:00.000 Hello and welcome to Trigonometry. I'm Francis Foster.

00:00:08.200 I'm Constantine Kissin.

00:00:09.320 And this is a show for you if you want honest conversations with fascinating people.

00:00:14.940 We are delighted to say that our fantastic guest today is a former Chancellor of the Exchequer under the Margaret Thatcher government, Lord Nigel Lawson. Welcome to Trigonometry.

00:00:24.500 Thank you.

00:00:25.680 It's a great pleasure to have you on the show.

00:00:27.840 So, as I mentioned, you were responsible for running this country's economy for over six years, I believe, in the 80s.

00:00:36.600 And you're now well into your ninth decade on this planet.

00:00:39.800 Have you seen anything like the sort of economic disaster that this country is facing at the moment in your time?

00:00:49.000 No, I haven't. It is appalling.

00:00:52.460 And I am afraid that the way we're heading is to a disaster.

00:01:03.220 And when you talk about the direction we're heading,

00:01:06.720 just for ordinary people who watch the show,

00:01:08.760 who may not be economists or experts in this,

00:01:11.800 who don't have your level of expertise,

00:01:13.400 can you just elaborate on what you see coming down the line for this country?

00:01:17.680 Well, the most serious thing I see coming down the line is nothing to do with this pandemic, nothing to do with the coronavirus.

00:01:27.920 I think that although this lockdown has almost certainly done more harm than good,

00:01:36.120 there's clearly a very good likelihood that at least one of the vaccines they come up with,

00:01:42.660 and I hope the others as well, but at least one of them will work

00:01:47.820 and that we will escape from this pandemic and its consequences.

00:01:53.820 The problem is the completely gratuitous disaster,

00:02:00.320 which I'm afraid to say, Boris Johnson, who I like,

00:02:03.920 has set out, the so-called Green Industrial Revolution.

00:02:12.660 this 10-point plan, this is the biggest disaster,

00:02:19.540 economic disaster, if they go through this.

00:02:23.540 And he seems determined to do so.

00:02:26.280 That has happened in my lifetime,

00:02:30.100 which is quite a long lifetime, as you pointed out.

00:02:35.160 I was trying to emphasize your level of experience

00:02:38.080 rather than to say anything about how old you are.

00:02:40.400 That was the goal.

00:02:41.780 But you mentioned this green strategy.

00:02:45.560 A lot of people will think that, you know, climate change is an issue that we need to tackle.

00:02:51.740 Some people say this is an opportunity to do that.

00:02:54.600 What is your concern with that economic strategy?

00:02:58.340 Well, the strategy, incidentally, I think that climate change is not a threat.

00:03:07.120 It's happening very gently at a fraction of a degree per decade,

00:03:14.300 which is something we can perfectly well live with.

00:03:17.260 But the problem is that this so-called strategy,

00:03:21.460 this Green Industrial Revolution,

00:03:23.160 is to move away from cheap, affordable and reliable energy

00:03:32.720 to extremely costly and unreliable energy.

00:03:37.120 And to do so at an inordinate cost.

00:03:40.940 All the experts, for example, Professor Michael Kelly

00:03:44.240 and everybody else who knows about the story.

00:03:47.180 And I know a little bit about energy because before I became Chancellor,

00:03:52.540 I was Secretary of State for energy.

00:03:54.940 So it's not a new field.

00:03:57.580 But the cost of moving from cheap and reliable energy

00:04:06.080 to very expensive and unreliable energy is massive and it's crazy.

00:04:13.660 And I really worry, I've never worried so much

00:04:16.660 about the future path of the British economy

00:04:22.420 and therefore of this country more than I do now.

00:04:27.580 Nigel, Lord Lawson, you're talking about this energy.

00:04:33.780 Specifically, what do we mean?

00:04:35.240 Is it wind? Is it solar panels?

00:04:38.140 What type of energy resources are we talking about here?

00:04:41.260 Well, the biggest thing that Johnson wants to move to is wind,

00:04:49.740 which is hugely expensive and very unreliable.

00:04:53.860 The wind people will tell you that the costs, although they're high now,

00:04:57.780 are coming down. That is totally untrue.

00:05:00.540 They are, if anything, going up.

00:05:02.480 So it is sort of a burden for the British people of their energy costs, the costs for travel, the costs for heating their home, every other cost involved in energy is going to increase really substantially, hugely, unless he has the sense to abandon this crazy plan.

00:05:31.580 And Lord Lawson, look, again, I'm an absolute layman.

00:05:35.880 I don't know the first thing about energy and all the rest of it.

00:05:41.620 But my question is, why, at a time of a global crisis, the pandemic,

00:05:47.700 when our economy looks ever more unstable, are we embarking on renewable energies?

00:05:55.580 That's a very good question. A very good question.

00:05:59.040 I think that it's partly because this has become, this greenery has become something of a new religion at a time when Christianity and other religions are less and less in people's minds and hearts and thinking.

00:06:22.820 But also I think it is designed to take our minds off the pandemic.

00:06:32.440 But it's crazy.

00:06:35.100 Lord Lawson, you were Chancellor of the Exchequer, as I mentioned.

00:06:38.860 If a Conservative Prime Minister, I'm sure the one you served under wouldn't have done this,

00:06:43.120 but if a Conservative Prime Minister had walked into your office and said,

00:06:46.500 Chancellor, what we need to do at this time

00:06:49.580 when we're facing the worst economic situation for 300 years

00:06:53.280 is to embark on this.

00:06:55.100 What would your words have been to that Prime Minister?

00:06:59.040 I would be flabbergasted.

00:07:01.300 Certainly Margaret Thatcher wouldn't have dreamt 1.00

00:07:03.920 with anything so stupid. 1.00

00:07:07.460 And I'm afraid that I would do my best 1.00

00:07:12.840 to dissuade the Prime Minister to say that.

00:07:15.560 and if not, I would leave the government.

00:07:19.120 It's an interesting thing also that it's a conservative government

00:07:22.560 that's doing this.

00:07:23.520 I mean, of all the different parties that we have,

00:07:25.540 you would have thought they might have been the least likely

00:07:28.420 to have done this, would you not?

00:07:30.480 I would have thought that.

00:07:32.500 It is crazy.

00:07:34.620 I think you have to see it to a certain extent

00:07:40.040 in the psychology of Boris Johnson,

00:07:43.320 who loves big projects, irrespective of the cost.

00:07:49.820 And Lord Lawson, I'm looking at this Conservative government

00:07:53.080 and this government, to me, doesn't seem particularly Conservative

00:07:56.960 and it doesn't seem very right of centre on economics.

00:08:00.340 Do you think this is a Conservative government?

00:08:03.900 Well, it is a Conservative government, but one has to see things as they are

00:08:10.720 and assess this project, the Green Industrial Revolution,

00:08:16.600 and it is absolutely mad.

00:08:20.860 I mean, of course, ironically, although it's mad,

00:08:26.360 the Labour opposition is supporting it, as you know.

00:08:29.640 So, because it seems to me that in this country,

00:08:33.240 we don't really have any credible opposition.

00:08:36.560 If you look at, for instance, the issue of lockdown,

00:08:39.560 The Labour government wants us locking down even harder, even faster, all the rest of it.

00:08:45.360 Now you're talking about this Green Revolution, which is going to cost the taxpayer even more, 0.99

00:08:50.500 which is going to make our energy source more unstable.

00:08:53.060 Again, the Labour government are not putting any form of opposition their way.

00:08:57.560 So quite frankly, it does seem we're in a form of political crisis now.

00:09:03.740 Well, certainly you're right.

00:09:05.380 And that's why I said a few moments ago that I've never been more depressed about the future for this country.

00:09:15.520 I mean, I hope that the government might come to its senses and abandon this plan.

00:09:24.640 But it is absolutely a commitment they've made so far.

00:09:28.320 But it's a suicidal commitment.

00:09:31.640 And setting that to one side, Lawson, I understand it's an important issue.

00:09:36.060 Of course it is.

00:09:37.120 But if we just rise above it a little bit and look at the bigger picture of the economy, from your vantage point, what do you see more broadly in terms of the cost of the lockdown, the cost of the pandemic, which has been great as well?

00:09:52.440 Not only the response to it, but the pandemic itself.

00:09:55.000 It's obviously taken lives.

00:09:56.340 It's forced us to reorganize the National Health Service.

00:10:00.880 It's forced us to focus resources in a different way.

00:10:04.960 And what do you see for the country, you know, setting the green agenda aside?

00:10:11.160 Well, I'm sorry to be so gloomy, but there are a number of things about the economy at this certain time before the green industrial revolution has got going.

00:10:25.120 As you know, I hope it never will, but Boris Johnson seems determined to do it.

00:10:32.320 But the project at the moment, the situation at the moment,

00:10:37.080 with this massive deficit, budget deficit,

00:10:41.060 with this huge, massive debt burden of the country,

00:10:50.700 And that in itself is quite alarming.

00:10:56.900 It's not necessary to have a deficit.

00:11:00.240 I mean, I was able to bring the country around,

00:11:05.340 turn the country around from a deficit not as big as this one now,

00:11:12.920 but pretty big, to a balanced budget and indeed a very small surplus.

00:11:18.980 and it's perfectly possible to do it.

00:11:22.340 But at the moment, everything is going in the wrong direction.

00:11:26.820 And how would you do it now?

00:11:28.460 How would you begin to tackle the deficit

00:11:31.000 and the massive mounting debt that we've incurred?

00:11:34.420 And let's be clear, it's not just something that's happened

00:11:36.780 in the last eight months.

00:11:38.860 We've been building up this debt and expanding our deficit,

00:11:42.900 which contributes to it, for decades now.

00:11:45.680 Well, you have to do it, obviously, on both sides of the balance sheet.

00:11:50.040 You have to cut back on government spending, which to a certain extent, in his latest statement, Rishi Sunak, the President-Chancellor, has started to do.

00:12:04.560 And you also have to do a bit on, however unpalatable, on the side of raising taxation.

00:12:11.560 And how severe do you, because we had austerity,

00:12:14.900 we had austerity in 2008 and it lasted however long it was,

00:12:18.880 I think almost 10 years.

00:12:20.300 Do you see us going into a second austerity now?

00:12:24.640 You might call it that.

00:12:27.440 But yes, that's what needs to be done.

00:12:31.460 And but how severe do you think these austerity measures are going to be?

00:12:35.420 Are they going to be deeper and harder than they were in 2008?

00:12:40.820 Well, we said they certainly need to be as hard, even now, because of the consequences of the pandemic.

00:12:53.640 They'll certainly have to be like that.

00:12:56.280 And after all, we survived that.

00:12:58.160 It wasn't a disaster.

00:12:59.860 We survived that.

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00:13:30.860 The world didn't come to an end.

00:13:35.660 But certainly a lot of people would argue that it was painful for many, many people.

00:13:41.480 Some people would say it led to a rise in crime due to a reduction in the number of police officers.

00:13:46.080 We can go down the list.

00:13:47.940 Obviously, all of that can be debated.

00:13:52.080 But I don't know that, and this is less of a question, more of a statement, really,

00:13:56.080 I don't know that many people recognized at a time when furlough was introduced,

00:14:01.040 when self-employment grants were introduced,

00:14:03.680 when the lockdowns were introduced,

00:14:05.500 the impact it would have on their lives.

00:14:07.580 And I wonder, frankly, if that had been explained to them,

00:14:10.800 whether we'd seen the same level of enthusiasm

00:14:12.700 for the lockdowns that we've had.

00:14:15.500 Well, no, the enthusiasm for the lockdown, I think, is misguided.

00:14:19.720 I think the evidence is accumulating

00:14:23.400 that the harm done by the lockdown is greater than any good.

00:14:32.920 You have to make tough choices and you never find in government

00:14:38.100 that everything you do could be all good and no harm.

00:14:42.500 It's always a mixture.

00:14:43.140 But you hope that what you do, the good, outweighs the harm.

00:14:47.420 I don't think the lockdown has.

00:14:49.040 This is not the main concern because I think it is likely that once the vaccination, I hope it happens straight away, at least once the vaccination is cleared as being safe and totally effective, that the lockdown will come to an end.

00:15:12.120 the problem

00:15:15.700 for the economy

00:15:18.180 doesn't go

00:15:20.080 just like that

00:15:22.280 but it

00:15:23.480 greatly diminishes

00:15:25.500 one of the problems

00:15:28.340 is that the

00:15:30.040 scientific advisors

00:15:31.820 who

00:15:33.180 advise the government on

00:15:35.560 the response to

00:15:37.140 the pandemic

00:15:39.280 have openly said that they don't take

00:15:44.680 the economic consequences into account.

00:15:50.380 They've said it to a House of Commons committee.

00:15:54.680 That's a matter for the Treasury.

00:15:57.220 But Boris Johnson has wanted to cover for everything.

00:16:02.120 So he thinks that if he can say,

00:16:03.880 well, this is what my scientific advisors recommend,

00:16:07.020 then that gives him a political cover that he would like.

00:16:13.160 There are distinguished scientists like Professor Gupta of Oxford,

00:16:23.120 who has also said that he's a scientist, a distinguished scientist,

00:16:27.340 that the lockdown is doing more harm than good.

00:16:33.700 Francis, do you like exploring your Englishness?

00:16:36.160 every single friday night really what do you do well you read a book do you i do actually

00:16:42.440 it's called exploring englishness and it's a book written by a trigonometry fan called vivian

00:16:49.280 endocott and you know it's good because this is the first book i've ever seen him reading

00:16:53.100 joking aside as you know i am now a british citizen but i'll still always think of myself

00:16:58.900 as russian for tax purposes having said that if my children grow up in this country having been

00:17:04.740 born here and think of themselves as still russian i'd be disappointed i'd feel like it was a failure

00:17:09.660 on my part to educate them to be part of this country that is the wonderful thing about this

00:17:14.980 book is it allows you to explore details of english culture to do activities to go on quests

00:17:20.720 so the nerd and me really enjoyed that the thing that i loved about exploring englishness was a way

00:17:26.240 that it avoided angry identity politics and instead focused on what makes this country great

00:17:32.000 the beautiful landscapes, the wonderful art, the exquisite cuisine.

00:17:36.160 He means Greg's.

00:17:37.620 Exploring Englishness was a finalist at the Dorchester Literary Festival this year,

00:17:42.220 and it makes for a great Christmas gift.

00:17:44.360 The book is £20 and available directly from the publisher, Ginger Pop Publishing.

00:17:49.940 Go to www.gingerpoppublishing.co.uk and order your copy in time for Christmas.

00:17:57.600 Just be aware, the only ship to UK addresses.

00:18:02.000 that's certainly the view that we we've come to on on this show talking to different doctors and

00:18:10.240 experts in the field uh but from you know you mentioned economics is it not the job of the

00:18:15.580 government to recognize that an economic impact that leads to an economic downturn that leads to

00:18:22.520 people being unemployed uh also has consequences on people's well-being on the number of people

00:18:28.600 who die on the number of people who sadly commit suicide.

00:18:32.060 All of those things surely must be taken into account

00:18:34.520 when these political decisions are being made.

00:18:37.340 Well, they should be.

00:18:38.040 I mean, you're quite right that the economic cost of the policy,

00:18:47.900 which is very considerable, includes obviously people losing their jobs,

00:18:56.980 people losing their livelihoods, and a lot of mental harm.

00:19:06.260 So it's not just some abstract thing.

00:19:12.440 It has a mental health cost as well as the economic cost.

00:19:19.200 They go together.

00:19:21.500 And Lord Lawson, what do you think?

00:19:24.160 Sorry, I'm so guilty.

00:19:26.980 No, no, it's absolutely fine.

00:19:28.880 Lord Lawson, what do you think is going to be the economic picture for us

00:19:33.720 when we finally emerge out of lockdown?

00:19:36.320 Do you think it's going to be very similar to a 1930s-style scenario

00:19:39.880 with a Great Depression?

00:19:41.260 Or dare I say, could it possibly be even worse?

00:19:45.180 Yeah, I don't know whether it'll be worse.

00:19:48.820 If the government abandons this appalling, disastrous proposal

00:19:57.980 for the Green Industrial Revolution, then it might not be worse than the 30s.

00:20:04.660 It'll be very bad, but the 30s were very bad too.

00:20:09.280 It'll only be worse than the 30s if he goes down this Green Industrial Revolution route. 0.96

00:20:18.820 You mentioned Boris Johnson and you said that you like him as a person, but you have concerns about some of his policies.

00:20:26.240 There was a broader question we wanted to ask you because the government you were part of with Margaret Thatcher at its helm is a government that will be hated by many people who watch the show and it will be loved by many people who watch the show.

00:20:40.900 But neither the people who hated that government nor the people who loved it could possibly deny that it was a government made up of the big beasts of politics. Margaret Thatcher, yourself, and dozens of others, and people, frankly, on opposite benches who were equally significant political figures in this country at the time. Do you feel that we have the same caliber of politician as we did in your time in government?

00:21:08.820 well it's difficult for me to be objective obviously but i think it was a good era

00:21:17.060 for the quality of uh politicians the good ministers and uh but there you go i mean

00:21:27.760 that always fluctuates doesn't it it does but surely you look at the caliber of politicians

00:21:33.780 being produced by both ends of the spectrum

00:21:36.280 and they both appear to be weak,

00:21:40.820 lacking in character, vigour, etc., etc.

00:21:43.760 Do you not find?

00:21:46.020 Well, you said that.

00:21:48.400 I wouldn't argue with you.

00:21:50.240 But the thing also is that Margaret Thatcher

00:22:01.420 was a very fine leader, which helped a great deal.

00:22:08.940 But not just that.

00:22:10.960 And you were saying, I think, or maybe Constantine was,

00:22:17.320 that people loved her, but they also hated her.

00:22:22.000 Clearly, until right at the end, anyway,

00:22:25.940 the majority of the people supported her.

00:22:30.520 I mean, she wouldn't have won three general elections on the trot 0.91

00:22:34.620 if the people as a whole had not approved of her and her government.

00:22:42.100 No, of course, my point was slightly different.

00:22:46.200 What I was saying was even people who hated her,

00:22:49.700 who I absolutely accept your point, were in the minority,

00:22:53.080 none of them would have questioned the calibre of politician that she was. 1.00

00:22:58.200 Whereas today, I think, frankly, there are politicians who I like and agree with whose caliber leaves a lot to be desired because they seem to be the best of what's on offer.

00:23:10.300 And that seems to be a concern to many people, that we don't have the big beast of politics anymore and the conviction politicians are very few and far between.

00:23:21.600 Well, that may be so.

00:23:22.800 But there are some individuals that are able.

00:23:29.000 The President of the Chancellor, well, he's very young.

00:23:32.120 I think he's very able indeed.

00:23:34.560 And what have you thought of Boris Johnson's leadership?

00:23:37.520 I mean, he has come to power at a time of national crisis.

00:23:43.840 One of the biggest challenges this country certainly has faced,

00:23:46.860 certainly since the Second World War.

00:23:48.300 How have you perceived his leadership to be?

00:23:52.660 He's very likeable.

00:23:55.580 And people like him.

00:23:57.740 That means that people like him.

00:23:59.760 And that's how he managed to win a large majority in the last election.

00:24:05.480 Some people call it charisma.

00:24:08.420 In fact, that's a fancy name for being likeable.

00:24:11.300 but he also 1.00

00:24:14.660 is a sucker

00:24:16.520 for big projects 0.99

00:24:18.400 you remember this ridiculous

00:24:22.400 bridge over the Thames 0.82

00:24:24.360 he wanted to build when he was

00:24:26.540 mayor of London

00:24:28.540 and any big projects

00:24:32.960 he is a sucker for

00:24:35.540 and the 0.99

00:24:38.520 problem now

00:24:40.060 because he's come up with the granddaddy of all big projects

00:24:47.840 and the fact that it is totally uneconomic.

00:24:51.980 And it's uneconomic not in the sense that the cost to the taxpayer

00:24:56.180 will be enormous, but the cost to everybody's electricity bills,

00:25:01.480 even if it can be done, which is not clear,

00:25:04.220 the cost to everybody's electricity bills, their heating bills,

00:25:08.560 their cars and so on, will be completely unaffordable.

00:25:15.380 And that's why no other country in the world is doing it.

00:25:20.160 So it does beg the question, then, why is he doing it?

00:25:24.060 Is it purely ego?

00:25:25.500 Is it because he genuinely believes in this project?

00:25:28.800 Why do you think the reasons are?

00:25:32.520 Well, you have to ask him.

00:25:34.540 But why do I think?

00:25:36.100 I think he gets swept away by the idea of this, as the French call them, grand projet, and he doesn't bother about the cost or the economics or anything like that.

00:25:56.180 So it is very important that his colleagues talk him out of this before he feels that he's got in too deep and can't extricate himself.

00:26:09.460 To make a small or smaller example of this is HS2, which is not his project, but it is a big project, and it is immensely costly, not as big as the Green Industrial Revolution.

00:26:30.920 and the costs get higher and higher each time they're revised.

00:26:38.160 And there's no economic case for HSTU at all.

00:26:41.100 But the feeling is too often that once you have already invested a lot of money in a project,

00:26:52.300 you can't stop it, otherwise the money is wasted. 0.96

00:26:57.040 That is foolish in the extreme. 0.56

00:27:00.920 Once you've taken a wrong decision, then you need to stop it. 0.97

00:27:06.440 You don't go on just because you took the wrong decision in the past,

00:27:11.940 recent past, and have spent a lot of money on it.

00:27:15.640 You stop digging.

00:27:18.640 And you've talked, just changing tack slightly,

00:27:21.880 you've talked about Boris Johnson's penchant for grand projects.

00:27:26.240 There was one you might call grand project, which was the centerpiece of his election in 2019, which was, of course, getting Brexit done.

00:27:38.440 What is your view of where we are now with Brexit?

00:27:41.280 Because, frankly, Francis insisted that we talk about it with you, whereas I am sort of, I think, more where most of the public are at the moment, where it's become a third-rate issue in many people's minds, although, of course, it is very important.

00:27:56.240 Where are we with Brexit and what do you see happening with that?

00:28:00.120 Are we heading towards no deal?

00:28:02.460 I've always thought that no deal would be the outcome.

00:28:08.540 There is no way that the European Union want to see us have anything

00:28:20.980 that is remotely like a good deal.

00:28:24.180 and that's not because they're anti-British

00:28:26.740 it's because there is a lot of

00:28:28.880 I've lived in

00:28:30.920 the European Union for nearly 20 years

00:28:33.460 and it is not

00:28:34.740 because they want to

00:28:37.920 do down

00:28:39.560 Britain as such

00:28:40.600 it is that there is a lot of

00:28:43.520 disaffection with the

00:28:45.500 European Union

00:28:47.220 in many parts of the European Union

00:28:49.820 and they feel

00:28:51.420 that if we

00:28:52.140 get out

00:28:55.460 and thrive

00:28:56.400 that will be

00:28:58.840 an example

00:29:01.100 to other countries who might

00:29:03.280 do the same and they might collapse

00:29:05.180 so they

00:29:06.920 want to make sure that

00:29:09.240 there's no way we can come

00:29:11.240 out of it in a way that

00:29:13.260 we certainly

00:29:15.140 I would find exceptional

00:29:16.980 and there's nothing wrong

00:29:20.980 with no deal.

00:29:22.980 No deal means that we trade

00:29:25.120 on World Trade Organization,

00:29:27.680 WTO terms,

00:29:29.520 which is perfectly

00:29:31.000 acceptable. And that is how

00:29:33.000 we do most of our trade,

00:29:35.520 trade outside the

00:29:36.940 European Union. And

00:29:38.920 we have no trade agreement

00:29:41.060 for example with the United States.

00:29:43.400 And we trade on a very

00:29:44.940 large scale with the United States.

00:29:46.760 We trade, we will

00:29:48.720 continue to trade on the

00:29:50.680 WTO terms and that's how most of the world's trade is conducted. But surely Lord Lawson this

00:29:58.500 is going to have a hugely detrimental impact on our economy. It's going to cause widespread

00:30:04.320 disruption. We've had Matthew Parris on the show who said that no deal is going to be

00:30:10.020 disastrous. But you disagree with this? Yes completely. I don't think Matthew Parris

00:30:18.080 for the most entertaining journalists

00:30:20.700 has any great knowledge of economics.

00:30:27.700 If we have no deal,

00:30:30.940 how we do economically

00:30:32.240 is going to be dependent

00:30:35.200 on how well we conduct our economic policy,

00:30:39.600 which is a matter for us outside the European Union.

00:30:44.840 I mean, self-government is not.

00:30:48.080 a terrible thing

00:30:50.300 we gave

00:30:53.440 self-government

00:30:54.920 to

00:30:55.800 huge numbers of

00:30:58.360 countries within the

00:31:00.440 British Empire

00:31:01.620 Commonwealth if you like

00:31:04.980 and

00:31:06.380 it is astonishing

00:31:08.340 and this was commended

00:31:10.360 that we gave them

00:31:12.780 self-government

00:31:13.580 it's very odd that people don't think we're capable

00:31:16.580 of governing ourselves

00:31:18.560 Would you deny that there would be a lot of disruption, though?

00:31:22.680 I mean, short-term disruption can be a reasonable price to pay for long-term outcomes that you want.

00:31:29.440 Would you accept that a no deal would be bad in that sense, at least in the short term?

00:31:34.960 Well, there'd be some disruption, certainly.

00:31:37.500 But that's not serious.

00:31:38.740 And, of course, don't forget that we would no longer have to pay the massive annual subscription we have to pay.

00:31:47.560 to be members of the European Union.

00:31:49.860 That seems to have become forgotten,

00:31:52.420 but it is very substantial.

00:31:53.940 You remember, at the beginning of the Thatcher government,

00:31:57.000 there was a great negotiation.

00:32:01.080 In fact, it started under Labour.

00:32:03.660 It was Jim Callaghan who, to begin with,

00:32:06.180 said that we are paying a quite excessive subscription

00:32:09.600 to the European Union.

00:32:13.260 and he didn't get anywhere.

00:32:19.260 Margaret Thatcher took up the baton

00:32:20.800 and she did get a rebate agreed.

00:32:26.780 But it's only a partial rebate.

00:32:29.620 We're still net contributors

00:32:32.440 to the rest of the European Union

00:32:35.520 on a large scale.

00:32:37.360 So that has to be offset,

00:32:39.160 not having to continue.

00:32:40.500 that needs to be hosted against the short-term disruption.

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00:33:57.860 The EU project, many people have said it's fundamentally doomed because of the inequality between North and South and particularly the euro.

00:34:06.580 What is your opinion on that?

00:34:10.580 Yeah, well, that is actually a fundamental point for your opinion.

00:34:17.720 It's actually a political project, almost entirely a political project.

00:34:24.000 And it began, the idea began a long time ago with Jean René,

00:34:30.380 that the idea is an economic means

00:34:35.100 to secure a political union.

00:34:39.480 Now, that's fair enough

00:34:40.500 if you want to be part of a political union.

00:34:44.220 But we ended it

00:34:46.440 at a time under the misunderstanding

00:34:48.780 that it was just an economic project.

00:34:52.660 In fact, it was called in those days

00:34:54.160 the Common Market.

00:34:56.280 And progressively,

00:34:58.000 specifically the European, the political nature of the European Union, which is not disreputable but I just don't share it, and the British have never shared it, makes it wrong for this country and unacceptable for this country, which the people of this country decided in the referendum.

00:35:24.000 I remember a long time ago, I knew a leader of the Labour Party who died before he could become Prime Minister, Hugh Gates, and he was passionately opposed to British membership of the European communities, I think it was called in those days, on precisely this ground, because it was a political project, not an economic project at all.

00:35:51.400 and a political project which is not what we in this country want to be part of.

00:36:00.020 So as far as you're concerned, we're heading towards no deal,

00:36:05.220 and that's fine, and that's where we were going to get to anyway.

00:36:10.840 Well, I think that we could sign the deal, but it would be a very bad deal.

00:36:18.280 That's the only one that our negotiators on the other side of the table will offer us.

00:36:27.320 And so I think that we will most likely end with no deal, which is better than a bad deal.

00:36:36.560 and indeed it's the only way that we can secure our freedom and independence

00:36:45.000 and have a warm and close relationship with them, no hostility.

00:36:52.100 We have a warm and close relationship with the United States

00:36:57.200 but that doesn't mean we want to be part of the United States.

00:37:02.140 And what do you see, Lord Lawson, as a future of the euro?

00:37:06.800 Do you think it's ultimately a currency that can survive and thrive,

00:37:10.300 or do you think that it's in its death now?

00:37:13.700 Well, it's certainly not thriving.

00:37:16.160 But at the moment, of course, all attention is focused on the pandemic.

00:37:21.860 But the euro is certainly not a thriving currency at all.

00:37:29.180 But I think that it creates problems for a number of countries, Italy in particular, in the European Union.

00:37:42.440 And we decided not to join the Euro, which was absolutely right.

00:37:49.520 But, of course, it means we have even less influence on any European Union decisions than other countries, because what happens in the European Union, the way decisions are taken, is that they have a meeting first of the Euro group, the group of countries in the European Union who have adopted the Euro as their currency.

00:38:19.520 and they reach a conclusion

00:38:22.160 and once that

00:38:24.280 conclusion is reached, that is a majority

00:38:26.540 in the European Council

00:38:28.100 so we have

00:38:29.700 no influence whatsoever

00:38:31.760 we've

00:38:33.320 never had a great deal of influence

00:38:36.060 within the European

00:38:38.000 Council, but it has

00:38:40.420 greatly diminished

00:38:41.720 to almost zero

00:38:42.700 following the

00:38:45.800 coming of the

00:38:48.020 Europe, and the Eurogroup, which is an inbuilt majority

00:38:52.360 and doesn't need to concern itself with countries

00:38:55.200 that should have not adopted the Euro, including the United Kingdom.

00:39:01.940 And Lord Lawson, we're obviously leaving,

00:39:05.480 and, I mean, it's been a palaver,

00:39:08.540 but we're finally leaving the European Union next year.

00:39:11.140 Do you think that's going to be the start of a domino effect

00:39:14.100 with more and more countries leaving the EU?

00:39:16.360 It depends how we conduct ourselves, how successfully. The greater the success of the United Kingdom outside the European Union, the more tempting it will be for the people of other countries to say, well, we might do that.

00:39:39.060 And if we make a mess of things, of course, then it will be less likely that other countries will wish to follow our example.

00:39:52.180 But I very much hope that we won't make a mess of things.

00:39:54.780 There's no reason why we should.

00:39:57.300 And as I said, we will be free from having to make this massive annual contributions or annual subscription.

00:40:09.060 to the European Union coffers.

00:40:12.660 And Lord Lawson, if you look back to that election,

00:40:16.360 or the referendum, I should say, in 2016,

00:40:18.980 and you see all the turmoil that has happened in this country,

00:40:22.380 the arguments, the fact that it's a highly divisive issue,

00:40:26.000 do you still think that having that referendum

00:40:29.320 was the right thing to do for the UK?

00:40:32.900 Absolutely.

00:40:33.660 There's no way we could extract ourselves

00:40:38.520 from the European Union without having a referendum for British people.

00:40:45.240 It's such a big constitutional matter that it needed referendums.

00:40:52.040 I'm not in favour of frequent referendums, but on this issue,

00:40:58.040 that was the only way we could get out.

00:41:03.660 It was ironic that, of course, we would never have had the referendum.

00:41:15.240 David Cameron would not have held a referendum if he hadn't been convinced that the Inns would win.

00:41:26.100 But that was not the case, fortunately.

00:41:29.500 Let me ask you a theoretical question, if I may.

00:41:33.660 Taking all of these issues together, the pandemic at the moment, seeing Brexit through, the economic challenges to do with lockdowns and with the pandemic as well.

00:41:45.000 How do you think the government that you were part of, as I said, spearheaded by Margaret Thatcher with you as chancellor and others, how would you have dealt with the current situation that we find ourselves in as a country?

00:41:59.020 Well, if you mean, first of all, dealing with a pandemic, I think that it is admittedly very difficult, but I think that we have to get the financial situation, the deficit and the debt to, but mainly the deficit.

00:42:24.980 because if you can gradually eliminate the deficit,

00:42:29.260 then the debt burden stops increasing.

00:42:32.860 It's still there, but it stops increasing, and that's crucial.

00:42:35.960 I think we'd have to do that, and I think we'd have to do it

00:42:39.380 by a form of rigor or austerity,

00:42:47.860 which is in the short term uncomfortable.

00:42:54.980 But it is sometimes necessary.

00:42:58.920 I don't think that just printing more and more money is a solution.

00:43:04.260 I just think it's building up more problems.

00:43:07.500 And, of course, you abandon crazy projects, in particular,

00:43:12.920 of which the Green Industrial Revolution, so-called, is the craziest. 0.87

00:43:20.380 And if we ever do embark on it, which the government seems determined to do,

00:43:24.740 or at least the Prime Minister's seat has tended to.

00:43:28.620 That will be the biggest disaster and will tend in tears.

00:43:37.040 But as I say, I hate to do this.

00:43:39.440 I've always been...

00:43:41.640 Lord Lawson...

00:43:43.540 ...by nature.

00:43:46.860 Lord Lawson, before we do our last question,

00:43:48.780 there was something that I wanted to ask you.

00:43:50.800 So I grew up in the 80s and the 90s.

00:43:55.460 If you look back at your government,

00:43:57.220 what are the things that you are most proud of

00:43:59.380 when you look back at the Thatcher government,

00:44:01.940 of the changes that you implemented,

00:44:03.840 things that you did,

00:44:05.160 ways that you moved this country forward?

00:44:08.020 Well, I think the most important thing

00:44:09.580 was turning the economy around.

00:44:14.460 Britain, when we came into office,

00:44:17.400 was a basket case.

00:44:18.820 And that's probably why we won the 1979 election. It wasn't because anybody was swayed by what we were saying. It was just because the economy was in such a mess with strikes all the time, huge industrial unrest, and an economy which is regarded with pity by countries around the world.

00:44:48.820 world, and we turned it completely

00:44:50.800 around, and at the end

00:44:52.380 we were regarded as an

00:44:54.840 example of how to

00:44:56.940 conduct

00:44:58.080 economic policy

00:45:00.600 successfully, and

00:45:02.680 that increased our influence

00:45:04.760 considerably, and there

00:45:06.840 were a whole lot of things

00:45:08.420 which were classical

00:45:10.160 economic policy

00:45:12.660 maybe, but there were also other things which

00:45:14.760 we were complete innovators

00:45:16.600 and subsequently other countries

00:45:18.660 have copied us, for example, privatisation.

00:45:22.420 Nobody had ever heard of privatisation.

00:45:25.200 In fact, there wasn't a word for it when we entered office.

00:45:29.360 We embarked on a massive privatisation campaign

00:45:33.240 which improved the working of the economy considerably

00:45:37.100 and led to other countries around the world

00:45:41.260 copying us, following us.

00:45:43.600 and there were privatization policies

00:45:49.260 that came in force in most countries of the Western world.

00:45:53.940 And the main thing was the successful conduct

00:45:58.760 of economic policy of the economy

00:46:02.100 and trade union reform, incidentally,

00:46:09.140 was part of that necessary process.

00:46:13.600 And as I say, we became an example to the rest of the world.

00:46:18.220 And Lord Lawson, on the flip side as well,

00:46:21.440 what were the mistakes that you thought you made in government?

00:46:24.620 Because every government makes mistakes and yours was no different.

00:46:28.320 What were the things looking back that you now go,

00:46:30.720 we got that wrong or we handled that badly?

00:46:33.180 Before Lord Lawson answers, can I just say,

00:46:35.300 Vladimir Putin's government has never made any mistakes.

00:46:37.760 it's not that we never

00:46:41.980 made mistakes but we

00:46:43.840 forget them

00:46:44.920 or learn from them but I can't tell

00:46:48.020 you this after this lapse

00:46:50.040 of time

00:46:50.600 which

00:46:53.020 what the mistakes were

00:46:55.220 every government

00:46:56.920 makes mistakes and kept of course Mr.

00:46:59.600 Putin's 0.59

00:47:00.160 and if you

00:47:02.960 can bother to read my memoirs

00:47:06.260 you will find I acknowledge

00:47:10.760 mistakes there in the memoirs

00:47:12.680 and I genuinely can't remember

00:47:15.020 what they were now

00:47:16.320 plus

00:47:19.040 plus

00:47:21.140 it's greatly outweighed the

00:47:22.640 minuses

00:47:23.860 how very convenient

00:47:26.420 that is the best get out of jail

00:47:31.120 free card I've ever heard in my life

00:47:32.940 Lord Lawson

00:47:33.500 it's been an absolute pleasure to have you on the show we know you watch the program from time to

00:47:40.560 time and that that is a big honor for us to have you as a guest here before we let you go uh we

00:47:46.880 should of course say everyone should read your memoirs uh but uh tell us what is in your opinion

00:47:52.880 other than the green industrial revolution because i feel like you've stuck the boot in on that one

00:47:57.480 pretty hard today other than that one issue uh what is the one thing that no one is talking about

00:48:03.740 that we really should be well i sorry to be a bore but i think that dwarfs that eclipses

00:48:11.640 everything else at the present time uh and i am as i say i am very concerned uh very concerned

00:48:21.620 although I have not much longer to live

00:48:24.560 I'm concerned about this country

00:48:26.640 and of course I have children and grandchildren

00:48:28.680 so I do care about the future

00:48:31.120 but I'm sure

00:48:33.840 that if there were anything else

00:48:36.820 you would have raised it

00:48:38.160 Your confidence is extremely misplaced Lord Lawson

00:48:42.720 but we thank you for it nonetheless

00:48:44.460 it's been an absolute pleasure speaking with you

00:48:47.180 we hope you at home have enjoyed it as well

00:48:49.440 and we will see you very soon

00:48:51.020 with another brilliant episode.

00:48:53.040 Take care.

00:48:53.600 See you soon, guys.

00:48:54.500 Thank you and bye-bye.

TRIGGERnometry - December 06, 2020

Lord Nigel Lawson：＂I've Never Been More Worried About This Country＂

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript

TRIGGERnometry - December 06, 2020

Lord Nigel Lawson： ＂I've Never Been More Worried About This Country＂

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript

Lord Nigel Lawson：＂I've Never Been More Worried About This Country＂