TRIGGERnometry - Trevor Phillips：＂We Live in the Age of Gangster Politics＂

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

00:00:07.880 I'm Constantine Kissin.

00:00:09.100 And this is a show for you if you want honest conversations with fascinating people.

00:00:14.260 What a terrific guest we have for you today. He's the former chairman of the Equalities and Human Rights Commission.

00:00:19.960 Trevor Phillips, welcome to Trigonometry.

00:00:21.960 Thank you very much indeed, Francis and Constantine.

00:00:25.140 It's been a while getting here, but I'm glad we are here now.

00:00:30.400 As are we. You know, in doing the research, one of the things that shocked me the most is your age.

00:00:37.420 You look so unbelievably young. It's unreal.

00:00:40.480 But you've had a distinguished career, a very long one.

00:00:43.400 I love this show already. I love this show already.

00:00:45.260 Can we just repeat that bit for another 25 times?

00:00:51.020 We can keep going on that topic, but you've had a distinguished career.

00:00:54.980 And the question I really want to ask you is, how have you gone from being one of the most prominent anti-racist activists and spokespeople to being where you are now,

00:01:06.440 which is being one of the most prominent critics of identity politics suspended from the Labour Party and here talking to us on this very problematic show?

00:01:14.300 How has that happened?

00:01:15.180 The world changed, Constantine. The world changed.

00:01:20.240 I wouldn't say that, you know, I'm not one of those idiots who sits around and says,

00:01:24.600 I stayed the same and everybody else changed.

00:01:28.600 That's nonsense. And that's both arrogant and also the mark of somebody extremely dim.

00:01:34.220 But it is also true to say that when I started on my journey in public life, which was as a journalist, really,

00:01:44.480 the things that mattered most were what's true, what do you know, what can you actually assert,

00:01:53.180 as opposed to what do you believe, to a place where actually now I think what seems to be more important is the last one.

00:02:03.420 What do you believe? And therefore, what facts, quote unquote, will you select? And whose gang do you belong to?

00:02:12.640 And I think if I were to give an answer to your question that made any sense, I suspect part of the problem in,

00:02:21.740 if you like, my public image as you've described it, is that I don't really belong to a gang.

00:02:27.840 So it's possible for anybody to say, oh, he thinks this, he thinks that, and he's wrong,

00:02:34.980 mainly because he doesn't belong to our intellectual or political gang.

00:02:40.580 Well, you know, that's life. I was brought up to believe that you stand on what you think,

00:02:50.580 you say what you think, you argue it out publicly. And you don't, you know, as we say in football,

00:02:57.500 you don't play the man, you play the ball. I think we've now got to a place where most political,

00:03:02.920 most public argument is about playing the man or woman, and not being too interested in what it is

00:03:08.240 they actually have to say. So I suspect the straight answer to your question is that the way

00:03:13.860 in which we talk about things in public and the way in which we deal with other people in public

00:03:19.420 has changed. All of our ideas have changed because the world has changed. But the way we argue things

00:03:26.120 out have changed. So whereas in, I guess, 1980, people would have worried about what is Trevor

00:03:31.160 Phillips saying? What they're now talking about is, you know, how many kinds of bastard is Trevor

00:03:36.120 Phillips, really? Well, let's explore that very subject on this show, Trevor. But, you know,

00:03:42.400 your use of the word gang is so fascinating to me because I almost feel like the sort of brutal

00:03:49.660 enforcement of conformity that happens within a gang is kind of like one of the changes we've seen

00:03:55.540 in politics as well. So, you know, I remember growing up in this country watching, you know,

00:04:00.640 Kent Clark be in the Conservative Party and Dennis Skinner being in Tony Blair's Labour Party.

00:04:06.860 And that was sort of the norm, like somebody who's completely on many issues opposed to the

00:04:11.780 leadership of their party being prominent, being respected, you know, having their voice heard

00:04:16.320 to where we are now, where you have to toe the party line. Is that a big change that has occurred

00:04:22.400 in our lifetimes?

00:04:23.800 It's a huge change. It's poisonous. You refer to my position within or outside. I'm a bit,

00:04:31.200 at the moment, I'm a bit Schrodinger's cat. I've been suspended by the Labour Party, but not expelled.

00:04:37.600 And for the record, since I wrote to the Labour Party now, 11 months ago, explaining or asking why

00:04:45.820 I'd been suspended, I haven't had a single communication, not a text, not a phone call,

00:04:50.800 not a letter. You know, you never write here. Anyway, so I literally am somewhere in some kind

00:04:59.100 of limbo. But the whole issue for me, and of me, has not really been an argument about whether

00:05:06.700 I wrote something or said something that was right or wrong. The whole, the reason that I was suspended

00:05:12.800 was because my very presence is in some way regarded as polluting the party. Now, that comes

00:05:21.640 to your point, that we no longer seem to be able to debate different points of view within a political

00:05:29.800 party. You either belong to the leadership faction or some other faction. And depending where you are,

00:05:37.760 you are fair game, you are going to be attacked by the others, not because of what you believe or

00:05:44.700 what you say you believe, but because you don't belong. Now, I personally, I mean, that's gangster

00:05:52.160 politics. That's gangster politics. And I'm not having it.

00:05:57.400 And Trevor, when did this culture begin to seep into the Labour Party, but also modern day politics as

00:06:03.840 well? That's a good and a very difficult question, to which I'm not sure I entirely know the answer.

00:06:11.380 I think there are a number of points at which you could name it. First of all, I think that

00:06:19.280 the Blairite group, of which everybody knows I was a part, introduced the idea into British politics

00:06:29.040 politics, that you could have message discipline. That is to say that if you belong to a political

00:06:35.920 party, and it takes a view, then you have to be pretty fundamentally opposed to that point of view

00:06:45.500 to go about saying that I think that the party is wrong. That is to say that there was some

00:06:52.380 responsibility on you as a party member, as part of the organisation, to stick to the line, really,

00:07:00.980 unless you really, really had some very basic fundamental disagreement. And I think that,

00:07:09.260 frankly, was a good thing. And it was a good thing for democracy, because it meant that the citizen

00:07:13.580 understands what the Labour Party or the Conservative Party stands for. What I think then happened was,

00:07:20.040 post-Tony Blair's leaving the leadership of the party, is that people interpreted message discipline

00:07:27.600 as a sort of authoritarian imposition. Not that you had to be persuaded, or you had to believe,

00:07:35.860 in some way, in what the party was saying. It was that, if you're a member of the party,

00:07:40.560 it doesn't matter what you think, as long as you go along with what the line is, then you're in.

00:07:46.760 And I think part of the problem was that Labour itself forgot to try to persuade people and simply

00:07:54.560 started to tell people what to do. And then others copied it. The Tories copied it when Cameron and

00:08:00.400 Osborne were in government. I think something else has happened, though, since then. And this is,

00:08:07.360 in a way, I suppose, pretty much fundamental to my view of contemporary politics.

00:08:12.360 In, when I was involved in student politics, and in my early time in politics, you could always say

00:08:21.680 that in the, if you think of politics as a vehicle, as a car, that there were two people in the front.

00:08:29.800 One was economics, and one was identity and culture. And historically, economics had its hand on the

00:08:37.080 steering wheel. You know, you decided where you stood, depending on whether you were for a big

00:08:42.940 state, whether you're for a lot of spending, or whether you're for, you know, deregulation, and so

00:08:48.260 on. And the identity questions, race, gender, and so on, sort of went along behind that. I think

00:08:55.920 over the last 10 to 12 years, maybe since the financial crash, something has happened in which

00:09:05.420 the position has been inverted. And now identity has its hands on the steering wheel. And that's a

00:09:11.100 problem, because it's no longer, your position in politics isn't just determined by what you think,

00:09:18.660 let's say, about race, or about trans rights. It's also influenced by what you are and what you look

00:09:24.940 like. So people who happen to be female, have greater authority on issues to do with gender.

00:09:33.100 People who look like me, apparently have greater authority in the issues of race.

00:09:37.360 Well, this is all a bit bizarre, isn't it? Because the fact that I am black doesn't make me

00:09:42.420 much of an authority, just on race or racial equality. Why would it? I mean, the fact that I've

00:09:48.940 got a liver doesn't turn me into a surgeon. I think something's happened in politics in which

00:09:56.200 the virtue and the value of knowing stuff, of having an argument that you can sustain, has

00:10:04.800 sort of disappeared and been subsumed under the prevalence of, for example, the jargon phrase

00:10:15.500 now is lived experience. If you can say, I've got this lived experience, it gives you some

00:10:21.660 automatic authority. When frankly, as I say, you know, because somebody happens to have

00:10:27.460 a brain, frankly, I'm not letting them take a scalpel to my head. You know, you need to

00:10:32.240 know stuff.

00:10:34.140 But Trevor, let me just push back on that idea. So wouldn't you say that your experience of

00:10:40.880 racism and your opinion of racism is going to be more valid than mine? Because you're

00:10:45.840 a black guy and you grew and you were around in the 80s and the 70s. And you saw a real visceral

00:10:51.380 hatred to black people that as a white person, I've never experienced?

00:10:57.560 No.

00:10:59.460 Why?

00:10:59.820 No. I mean, the point is, look, I've experienced those things. But there are two there are two

00:11:09.380 issues here. First of all, the fact that I experienced, you know, going on on leading

00:11:18.000 demonstrations against the National Front in the 70s, doesn't say anything about my knowledge

00:11:25.120 and ability to deal with the ethnic pay gap in a large corporation. There is absolutely

00:11:32.600 no particular relationship between those two things. And the question you have to ask yourself,

00:11:39.380 is, does, which one of those things matters more today? The National Front doesn't exist.

00:11:48.000 We put the British National Party out of business. But what we do know is that some ethnic groups

00:11:55.520 are about 50% behind others in average pay. Which one of those things is most important right

00:12:04.780 now. Well, I would say it's a second, it's a pay question. And the fact that I might have marched

00:12:10.000 against the National Front doesn't automatically give me any authority on that second question.

00:12:16.120 It happens that I know quite a lot about it, probably more than most. But that's because

00:12:21.460 I spend a lot of time studying charts. I've done a lot of the research. I've, you know, I have a couple

00:12:29.080 of companies. One is a big recruitment company, one is a smaller data analytics company, which

00:12:33.920 sort of started as a hobby, but is now a commercial enterprise. And we work with a lot of clients. So

00:12:39.460 we know stuff. And it doesn't matter. The fact I've got the skin, the colour I've got, isn't what gives

00:12:45.800 me authority and knowledge there. It's the fact that I spend night after night after night trying to

00:12:51.240 solve the problems of our clients on these issues. So this whole idea that being a thing gives you

00:12:59.420 automatic authority over everything to do with that thing is just nonsense. And by the way, the other

00:13:07.480 point is, the fact that I might have had an experience as a black person doesn't mean every

00:13:12.500 other black person's had the same experience. That's the thing I hate most. The idea that once I've walked

00:13:17.240 into a room, everybody thinks that they know exactly everything about me, and that every other black

00:13:22.180 person is exactly the same. Now, if you want to put the R word on anybody, or any kind of thinking, that's it.

00:13:31.740 Troy, you're giving me goosebumps here, because it's such a refreshing take. And it's refreshing while

00:13:38.040 simultaneously being, I feel like the way we used to talk and think about these things, the facts matter, feelings

00:13:44.040 less. So yeah, you can add a little bit of experience here or there to modify your view on things. But

00:13:49.180 overall, what matters is our ability to look at reality. So how do we untangle this web that we've

00:13:56.900 woven for ourselves, where who you are matters a lot more than what you actually know? And just

00:14:05.460 this, everything is determined by your skin color. Like, it's regressive beyond belief to me. How do we get

00:14:12.340 out of that? You've got to fight every battle every day. I mean, you know, to take a sort of

00:14:18.580 apparently not very related example, but it's a, you're asking about how do you win an identity

00:14:26.640 battle? Probably the biggest single political... But how you stop playing the identity game is what

00:14:31.440 I'm really asking. Yeah, well, let me just take what might appear to be a little bit of a diversion,

00:14:37.680 but it's not a very big one. The biggest single identity question in the United Kingdom today

00:14:43.240 is probably the issue of Britishness, as opposed to the components of Britishness. And the political

00:14:50.220 area in which that being fought out is over Scottish independence. Now, our friends in the

00:14:58.000 Scottish National Party will say that their nationalism is all civic, and it's all based on policy,

00:15:04.440 and all that. But actually, they know, and everybody else knows, that for 25 years, they have fought

00:15:13.560 little battles every day, in every school, in every workplace, to have the idea of Scottish identity,

00:15:23.340 an ethnic identity, recognised, essentially tartanising Scottish life. Now, I'm not criticising

00:15:30.880 them for that. But in a sense, I admire what they've done, because they have simply fought every

00:15:37.560 battle to assert that Scottishness is significant, is a significant identity, and should be part of

00:15:45.460 people's decision making about politics, about where they work, how they treat their neighbours,

00:15:50.540 and so on. And in the same way, I think the answer to your question is, there isn't a sort of great,

00:15:57.640 big, single answer. I think this is an issue that was going to be fought on every single front,

00:16:03.860 on the issues of, let's say, statues, on the issues of what's in the curriculum, on the question of

00:16:09.580 should you monitor ethnicity pay gaps or not. And at the heart of it, for me, I mean, you know, I'm a

00:16:15.280 geek. Basically, what I should have said right from the very beginning is, what you need to understand

00:16:21.020 is, I'm a guy who is happiest, not doing this, but worrying about spreadsheets, running software,

00:16:29.480 to try to work out what the patterns are, where is the problem? And therefore, where do we put the

00:16:35.480 effort? So my big thing, to be honest, is I think we need more data, we need more facts, and we need to

00:16:42.400 share that more with the public. At the moment, when we talk about race, it's all about feelings,

00:16:48.020 it's all about my impression, even though the impression of an individual doesn't tell you very

00:16:54.840 much about the whole group, or indeed, the whole country. So when we talk about race and identity,

00:17:02.380 it's like, the parallel, I suppose, I would sometimes make is that trying to read the political

00:17:08.220 landscape with an impressionist painting, rather than when what you really need is a Google map,

00:17:15.200 that is clear and sharp.

00:17:19.500 And Trevor, don't you think part of the problem is as well, is that we ingest narratives, we all

00:17:24.020 have narratives, whatever they may be, you know, everyone who voted Brexit is racist, the EU is

00:17:29.220 a universal force for good, Scottish nationalism is positive, English nationalism is negative.

00:17:35.120 And like you said, we don't appear to be analysing the data. Why have we become so obsessed with

00:17:40.860 narratives and not thinking for ourselves?

00:17:44.720 Because it's way easier. It's way easier. I mean, the point about most politics is a very simple

00:17:52.160 one. There is no good or bad in any political decision. Otherwise, it wouldn't be a decision.

00:17:59.580 I mean, you know, what idiot would say there's a good way to tackle the health service or COVID or the

00:18:07.120 economy. And there's a bad way. Why do we choose a bad way, man? I mean, that's, that's more that.

00:18:13.040 I mean, that's just stupid. The point is, most political decisions are only political decisions,

00:18:19.600 because what you're actually doing most of the time is choosing between bad and worse. And the way that

00:18:26.640 you evaluate bad or worse, to some extent depends on your character. It depends on the range of

00:18:34.280 knowledge and data that you have available. And it depends by and large on your instinct. I mean,

00:18:40.500 you know, I've been, I've run big organisations, I've been in politics a lot, a long time. One of the

00:18:46.900 things that I think most politicians hesitate to say is that almost every decision you take has to be

00:18:57.140 taken on the basis of incomplete information. You know, it's always great. And we've seen this a lot

00:19:03.600 in COVID, that everybody knows six months down the line, exactly what should have been done.

00:19:10.620 The truth is, when you have to take the decision, almost always, you're having to take it on the

00:19:16.000 basis of some data that you have available, but a guess or a projection on what might happen.

00:19:24.820 And to some extent, that will depend on your experience. There's a, I won't get into the boring

00:19:30.840 technicalities of it. But there's a sort of a kind of analysis called Bayesian analysis, which

00:19:36.240 in which you use your experience of situations to try to predict what's going to happen next.

00:19:45.160 And some of it, frankly, just depends on what your instinct and your preferences for the kind of

00:19:50.520 society you want to live in are. So for example, somebody like me, who really values

00:19:57.020 individual choice more, I think, than what you might call solidarity, which doesn't make me a Tory,

00:20:06.300 it just means that I've grown up in a circumstance in which, frankly, I don't really like to be told

00:20:12.180 what to do by the state, because that's mostly run by people who are not like me. So my tendency,

00:20:19.420 generally speaking, is to go, yeah, okay, thanks very much. I'll make my own decision. I'm not going to

00:20:24.800 depend on you. Somebody else might equally validly, who, for example, has spent their life and benefited

00:20:34.140 from the health service or the education system, say, I trust government, I trust the state. That

00:20:40.140 doesn't make them bad, but it means they'll make a different decision to me. Now, I think part of the

00:20:44.180 problem with politics at the moment is that it just refuses to recognise that both of those positions

00:20:50.440 can be equally valid. And the task of politics is to navigate and negotiate between those different

00:20:57.920 views.

00:20:59.620 I mean, it's a really, really, you know, really good way of summing it up, because it just seems at the

00:21:08.420 moment that those two types of people, they can't agree on anything. They can't agree. Whereas before,

00:21:15.380 we used to listen and go, well, look, I don't agree with what you've said, but I can see the merits and

00:21:20.020 the value of your argument. But now it just seems that we are two ships who are just simply drifting

00:21:25.140 further and further apart.

00:21:27.100 You're just talking about me and him.

00:21:30.340 Yeah, well, I know the two of you, basically, after this, you're just going to punch each other

00:21:34.560 in the face. And so I know that I know how you lot have fun. So but let's not go into that.

00:21:43.080 You'll have to rod us around in a minute. But I think you're right up to a point. But one of the

00:21:50.780 things I when I was an editor and the executive producer, one of the terms that I basically banned

00:21:59.280 was something you just said, we are like this, or we are like that. And it's interesting. See,

00:22:09.920 I think that's now used very, very widely. What people usually mean by that, actually, is everybody

00:22:17.020 I know is like that. They don't actually know the whole country is like that. They don't know that

00:22:23.080 all men are like that. They just know that everybody they talk to is like that. I think this is part of

00:22:28.140 the problem. You've discussed on this show, I know, the echo chambers that has been encouraged by social

00:22:34.500 media and so on. I think that there's a big problem in this country, and to some extent in the United

00:22:40.440 States, that the we that the decision makers, the opinion mongers, that you know, the what Vernon

00:22:48.060 Bogdana, the constitutional historian calls the exam passing classes. When we when people like us use

00:22:54.720 the term we, we actually literally mean people like us. But unfortunately, that's only 15 10 15% of the

00:23:01.040 population. I think the truth is that 80% of the population don't have those kind of vicious knockdown

00:23:09.260 drag out, you're this you're a fascist, no, you're a kind of anarchist, lunatic argument. Most people in

00:23:17.000 most of the time, in most families, they might disagree about Brexit, or, you know, or about

00:23:24.140 whether we should have masks or not have masks. But they will listen to each other with respect.

00:23:30.560 And in the end, they'll say, look, look, Uncle Jim, I hear what you're saying, but I just I'm just not

00:23:35.700 convinced. Most of this country, I think, doesn't participate in that sort of vicious rhetoric.

00:23:44.040 And I think for myself, that is the biggest problem in politics, that the people who are having

00:23:50.160 most of the airtime, who get most of the space, who get on shows like this, are busy shouting each

00:23:59.080 other down, and telling everybody else, he's a wanker. Excuse me, forgive me, I know you don't like

00:24:04.460 this. You can swear all you want. He's a tosser. He doesn't know his arse from his elbow. Whereas

00:24:13.920 most people go, yeah, yeah, okay. But most things are a matter of judgment. They're not

00:24:21.880 black and white, right or wrong. And we've simply that the elite classes, one reason I hate the

00:24:29.600 political and media elite, with a deep loathing, they have simply lost the skill, or the desire

00:24:37.380 to have that kind of conversation.

00:24:40.500 Yeah, I mean, it's an interesting point you make. We do try and steer away from that as

00:24:45.580 much as we can on the show. But obviously, you're going to get people coming through as

00:24:50.360 well, who have strong opinions about stuff. And it's a balance to be struck. In our defense,

00:24:55.080 I've got strong opinions. Sorry to interrupt you. I have very strong opinions. As my children

00:25:01.880 would say, I will start, not that I could, but I will start an argument in an empty room.

00:25:09.540 But what I object to about what we're doing at the moment, is that not only do we disagree,

00:25:17.380 but we disrespect people with whom we disagree. And I think that's intolerable. I think that is

00:25:27.700 the antithesis of a democratic society.

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00:28:38.380 I think you're right. And we all, I think, particularly with social media, all of us

00:28:45.520 can take responsibility. I certainly would include myself in this for sometimes, as you

00:28:50.240 say, playing the man and not the ball. So I take your criticism gratefully.

00:28:56.000 But one thing we will say is the episode will be called, Trevor Phillips called me a wanker.

00:29:00.220 That would be brilliant. But listen, Trevor, I want to talk to you about identity. We started

00:29:08.440 with it and you alluded somewhat to it. This idea, and we have mentioned it, but I want to go deeper

00:29:15.680 into it. This idea that you should see yourself as part of a racial group, as a tribe, as a member

00:29:22.840 of a tribe. And I should see myself as a member of a different tribe. And Francis should see himself

00:29:28.380 as a member of another tribe. Where does that lead us? Because, you know, I've studied a little

00:29:34.620 bit of history, and I'm not optimistic. Where does that take a society, in your opinion?

00:29:42.120 Well, it could take you into Rwanda, or some of the worst excesses that we've seen in the United

00:29:51.500 States. But it could equally take you, I think, in a modern society into a different place. I mean,

00:30:01.700 you know, tribalism, we think of as automatically a bad thing, because it has often descended into

00:30:11.440 a competition for resources between people who look like me, are related to me, and people who look

00:30:20.220 like you and are related to you. And I don't have to make any judgment about what you think, what sort

00:30:26.900 of person you are, what your desires are, what your ambitions are. As long as you look like you look,

00:30:33.780 you're the enemy. I get that. I get that that is one outcome of tribalism. But maybe this is, in a way,

00:30:44.060 coming back to what I was saying earlier on about the influence of background. I come from a very big

00:30:49.860 family. You know, I'm the 10th of, as far as we know, 10 of my father's children. And, you know,

00:30:59.940 tonight, for example, we're going to be on the Zoom. And there'll probably be 40, 50 of us.

00:31:06.420 And that's just a bit, that's just a bit of the outfit. But we are, we are a tribe. But in that

00:31:16.560 tribe, there are doctors, there are lawyers, there are management consultants, there are people,

00:31:22.260 you know, there are people who act as bailiffs, there are people who are unemployed, there are

00:31:28.920 people who do not go out to work. There's, I think there's probably a millionaire or two in there

00:31:33.700 somewhere. There are all sorts. But there's something that brings us together. We all have,

00:31:40.860 in this case, the same grandmother. And there are things that we share because of that. There are lots

00:31:47.440 of other things we don't share because of that. But I value the things that we share. I mean,

00:31:54.200 they are important to me. They're the things that make me the sort of person I am, to a large extent.

00:31:59.880 That doesn't mean that were I to, you know, come on a similar gathering in the Kissin family or the

00:32:09.940 Foster family, I would think, I'd automatically think, let's eliminate the Kissins, let's eliminate

00:32:15.480 the Fosters, because they're not as good as us. What I'd probably be doing is thinking, what those guys

00:32:19.640 got that we could copy? So my view about this idea of identity is that we should never get into the

00:32:28.860 place where what we're saying is, identity is bad, because we are all the same under the skin,

00:32:36.620 which is complete balls. Everybody knows that we are not. Yeah, we are creatures of our environment.

00:32:42.200 We are people who belong, who belong to it. You know, I'm, I come from a religious background,

00:32:48.800 a Christian background. I believe in it. And it's important to me, it gives me my values.

00:32:54.540 That doesn't mean that I think somebody who has a different faith is a worse person, actually.

00:33:01.420 For example, there are many things from Islam I wish we could borrow. For example, attitude to alcohol.

00:33:07.840 So my point about this whole issue of identity is, there is nothing wrong with cleaving to an identity

00:33:16.000 and regarding it as important. What is wrong is regarding everybody else's identity as somehow

00:33:22.200 lesser than yours or wrong? And secondly, thinking that everybody who shares some aspect of your

00:33:30.600 identity has to be exactly the same as you and take the same outlook as you do. That's where we're

00:33:36.980 going wrong with that issue. Well, let me add another point to borrow your family metaphor. The one thing

00:33:43.420 that will unite your family is some sort of shared values, which, which, while not explicit,

00:33:52.200 will be there, right? There are things perhaps passed down by your grandma, grandmother to everybody

00:33:57.320 else. And I wonder whether that is where we are going wrong, because you, you mentioned the issue

00:34:03.660 of Britishness before. I can certainly tell you from my point as a first generation immigrant,

00:34:08.520 you know, I am surprised by how terrified people are of even admitting that such a thing as British

00:34:16.220 identity exists. We can't seem to define what British values are. And again, when I say we, I do mean

00:34:22.500 that the chattering classes, of course I do. So there is that, that perhaps is an issue. Do we have enough

00:34:29.540 holding us together when we're encouraged to focus a lot on our individual identities? Do we have enough

00:34:36.340 as a society to hold us together? I absolutely think we do. And by the way, I mean, let's take this

00:34:43.760 issue of first generation immigrants. You know, if you, and this is where, you know, I'm a data guy.

00:34:52.440 So I, I don't worry about what somebody told me in Tesco last week, I go and look at the data.

00:34:57.140 So if you ask people in this country in general, do you think speaking English routinely is going to

00:35:08.600 be an advantage to your children? 80 something percent, probably more will say yes. And the

00:35:16.860 people who are most hawkish on this issue are not white people who tend to go, oh yeah, well, we need

00:35:23.260 to, we need to take into account the fact that all those Pakistanis speak some other funny language

00:35:28.180 at home and no, no, no. No, actually the people who are most hawkish are the first, are the immigrants.

00:35:35.860 Why? Because our experience is, if you are going to prosper in this society, which in many ways is

00:35:43.420 hostile, you absolutely need to master this society's ways, starting with its language. So immigrant parents,

00:35:52.720 and I, I, I, I defy you to, to tell me that this is wrong. Immigrant parents of all backgrounds will

00:35:59.380 be saying to their children, you have to be twice as good as them to get half as far. So pass your

00:36:07.260 exams. Don't give me any nonsense about you're going to be a musician or an actor or any of that kind of

00:36:12.320 stuff. Go and become an accountant or a doctor or a lawyer, get a job. And then you can play as much

00:36:19.640 music as you like once you've got the job, right? That is the immigrant position. Immigrants, more than

00:36:26.320 anybody else, actually cleave to the idea, the reality of what being British is like. That's why

00:36:34.420 they come here. So this whole idea, this is somehow, you know, we've got to get all complicated and get

00:36:43.060 ourselves in a state about British identity, because otherwise the immigrants are going to feel

00:36:47.740 a bit alienated, only comes from people who have never met an immigrant, actually.

00:36:53.540 Agreed. Yeah. Agreed. But that's exactly my point, though, Trevor, which is, it's the, the people who are

00:36:59.800 the chattering classes, uh, who don't understand the impact of their actions on people like me and my

00:37:07.600 children, who are going to be telling them that they don't need to, you know, whatever it might

00:37:13.740 be, whether it's to speak English or to, to understand the local culture, they don't need

00:37:18.440 to blend in or settle in, or they don't need to integrate. They need to just, you know, dive as

00:37:24.040 deeply as they can into the Russian Jewish identity or whatever other nonsense they come up with.

00:37:28.340 Shall I tell you why? Shall I tell you why? And this is one of the reasons that, this is one of the

00:37:32.280 reasons that all that lot, all that chattering class hate me. Um, I, I, I frequently say that

00:37:37.600 the one thing that white liberals most hate is a black man who doesn't owe them a favor

00:37:44.520 and who they can't patronize. One of the reasons is they like the idea that, you know, we are outsiders

00:37:54.240 who suffer, who need to be looked after, who constantly need to be saved. It's really important

00:38:02.000 that we stay different and that we stay at the bottom of the pile. Because if we don't, two

00:38:10.140 things are true. One is we don't need to depend on them to look after us. And the other thing that

00:38:17.520 is true is that we might actually take their jobs. And of course, one of the problems that we are going

00:38:24.880 to see, and we're to some extent seeing it already, is that some minority groups, particularly Indians

00:38:32.300 and Chinese, are earning, in those cases, something like 12 and 15 percent more on average per hour

00:38:42.280 than white Brits. Now, I don't sit inside the homes of white families. But I bet you,

00:38:51.220 I bet you that there is a sneaking anxiety about all of these clever Indian doctors and accountants

00:39:01.080 somehow creeping up the ladder. We're seeing it in Technicolor in the United States, where whites are

00:39:09.000 likely to become a minority. They're not that bothered, to be honest, about African Americans,

00:39:13.880 because they, you know, they can always patronize African Americans, because we're still, or not we,

00:39:20.060 the African Americans are still way behind. They really hate the Asian Americans, really hate the

00:39:25.180 Asian Americans, because actually, those guys have pitched up, they're the fastest growing

00:39:30.480 population group. And you know what, they dominate some of the industries, particularly some of the new

00:39:37.560 ones, the digital ones, the digitals. So one of the issues, I think, that we are all going to have to

00:39:43.400 confront is the sense that the old order of things in which, you know, elite white people sit at the top

00:39:56.660 of society. They look down on us, and can stroke our heads and tell us how much they care about us.

00:40:06.000 And that makes them happy, because that means everything stays the same. That they are unsettled,

00:40:13.220 particularly by anybody from a minority who says, you know what, don't really need you to look after

00:40:19.420 me, mate. I can get on with it. And you see that many, many times, particularly with first-generation

00:40:26.700 immigrants who are openly conservative, or black people who are openly conservative. You just see

00:40:32.320 white liberals, they can't seem to get their head around it. Like, my mother is, you know, a first-generation

00:40:37.720 immigrant, you know, right-wing, voted Brexit, you know, Latin American, whatever else. And my liberal

00:40:45.160 friends, well, actually, I don't have any anymore. Unfortunately. I was going to say, Francis, who is

00:40:51.060 that? But when I had them, they couldn't seem to get their head around the fact that she would be

00:40:58.760 in this particular mould. They just couldn't believe it. I mean, look, let us bear in mind that, on average,

00:41:07.600 some minority groups are less well-off in relation to employment and education. Nobody, I hope, on this

00:41:16.360 conversation is going to deny the existence of individual personal bigotry, and the fact that

00:41:25.200 there are some cultural, and what people these days, though they don't understand what they mean by

00:41:30.540 this, there are some structural inequities, which are, which relate to race. You know, none of that, there's no

00:41:38.540 point in arguing about that, because... Trevor, just clarify that for us, because I think it's an important

00:41:43.940 point. When you say structural inequities, and you say that a lot of people don't know what they mean by that,

00:41:49.620 could you explain to people who are open-minded, watching this programme, who keep having this idea of structural

00:41:56.620 inequality shoved down their throat by people who, as you say, don't really understand what they're

00:42:01.400 talking about? What is the legitimate case for structural inequities in society?

00:42:08.180 All right, let me, if I may, a small, mini-seminar on this.

00:42:13.880 Perfect.

00:42:14.540 I was very lucky, because I'm very old. I was very lucky to have met Stokely Carmichael,

00:42:20.820 later known as Kwame Touré, who was one of the leaders of the radical end of the civil rights movement.

00:42:28.620 He was the leader of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee in the late 60s.

00:42:37.700 And he would have described himself, did describe himself, as a scientific socialist, a Marxist.

00:42:43.160 He and a man called Charles Hamilton coined the phrase institutional racism, because they wanted

00:42:51.800 to make a distinction between themselves and Martin Luther King. Stokely's argument was that

00:42:59.800 you could have replaced the entire New York Police Department with a choir of black angels,

00:43:09.200 and it would still be arresting and beating black young people, that some of the symptoms of racial

00:43:19.720 discrimination and bigotry were independent of what anybody, any individual thought, and how good and how

00:43:29.860 lovely they were. His argument was that King and others spent all their time trying to persuade white

00:43:36.840 black people to be nice, when actually that would only have a marginal impact on where black people

00:43:44.360 lived, what jobs they got, their levels of education, and so on. I, as it happens, agree with Stokely

00:43:50.780 Carmichael, and still do. Spin forward to today. Some of the so-called radicals, who frankly are not very

00:43:58.320 radical at all, shout about structural racism. And when you test them, what they really mean is,

00:44:05.300 why don't we pull down some nasty people, whether they are, they happen to be dead white men who

00:44:10.780 are remembered in bronze, or maybe somebody who's made some unpleasant remark. And what they mean by

00:44:18.020 structural racism is some really bad individual bigotry. What I mean by structural racism is that,

00:44:25.880 for example, when people of Pakistani Muslim background came here, they almost totally went

00:44:35.140 into areas where industries with which they were familiar, textiles, were booming, and that's why

00:44:42.780 they were brought in. They were needed to work in those industries. What then happened was, those

00:44:49.620 industries died. That meant that the towns that they lived in died. Somebody once said to me,

00:44:56.300 the point about Burnley is that the only reason for it still to exist is because it's got a football

00:45:02.180 club. So the point about, the problem for that group is not that everybody hates them because

00:45:08.860 they're Pakistani Muslims. It is that structurally, history put them in a place where they were at a

00:45:15.820 disadvantage, and generation after generation, for reasons that will be obvious, they remain at a

00:45:21.400 disadvantage. And that is, there are parallels in all other groups. By the way, some other groups,

00:45:29.300 Indians I refer to, Indians I refer to, have had the reverse experience. They have followed in the

00:45:36.000 professional path of some other groups, and actually, their culture, their background, their

00:45:41.080 situation, to some extent, has helped them to prosper. So my point is that the people who talk about

00:45:49.140 structural racism, and then put as a solution, let's get rid of person X, or let's cancel person Y,

00:45:58.520 literally don't know what they're talking about. They literally don't know what they're talking about.

00:46:03.000 They are pursuing an old school, conservative position that says, if only people would be lovely

00:46:09.700 to us, then we would solve this race problem. Actually, they're not the real radicals. The real

00:46:14.660 radicals are the people who say, we have to do something about history, and geography, and

00:46:21.220 economics to solve this problem. Trevor, let me just ask one question, one question, for a better

00:46:28.080 understanding of what you're saying. So the only issue I have with what you've just said is, if that

00:46:36.000 structural difference has disadvantaged Pakistanis, in your example, but advantaged Indians, can we

00:46:44.460 really call that racism? Isn't that just structural difference due to history, and economic inequality

00:46:50.360 due to poverty? Is it not inappropriate to describe that as racism?

00:46:57.660 Probably, if you use the word racism to mean personal dislike. But you see, I don't think of

00:47:05.460 racism as personal dislike. I mean, let me be absolutely clear. One of the reasons that I

00:47:09.040 suppose I really get on these people's tits, is that I don't really care what white people think

00:47:15.420 about me. They care about it a lot. These people are obsessed with being liked and esteemed by white

00:47:24.340 people. I literally do not care. What I care about is that I do not lose opportunities, which should be

00:47:31.560 open to me because a white person is prejudiced against me. I don't want them to like me, but I

00:47:40.020 want them to recognise me for what I am. So when we talk about racism, one of the reasons I criticise

00:47:46.520 all those critical race theory nutjobs is that they're not radical at all. They talk about racism

00:47:55.220 like it's a fashion statement. I think about it as a social and economic and cultural

00:48:03.680 cage from which some people cannot escape. That to me is a serious conversation. This whole idea that,

00:48:15.420 you know, if we could get people to be nicer, it's pathetic. It's just pathetic. It's like the kid

00:48:23.060 at the back of the class who really desperately wants the most popular kid in the class to like

00:48:28.800 him and be his best mate. I mean, honestly, that's radicalism. Give me a break.

00:48:34.940 And we were talking about the structure and equality, but when you were talking about that,

00:48:40.320 my pushback would be, but that also applies to a lot of white working class people as well,

00:48:45.640 particularly communities like in Cornwall or Wales, where, I mean, I taught in Cornwall. And

00:48:51.820 when I, you know, first time I ever went there, it was holiday season. And I thought, oh, this is

00:48:56.000 lovely. And then I went to teach here and I was shocked at the levels of poverty that these children

00:49:01.480 were having to exist in, not live, exist. Correct. I completely agree. I mean, one of the things that

00:49:09.740 is saddest about what has happened in this country, you know, there's a great tradition here of

00:49:18.480 seaside towns. And when I was growing up, you know, a holiday to South End or

00:49:26.180 a day trip to somewhere, you know, Wimbledon in Dorset or somewhere was a really, for an inner city kid,

00:49:35.200 this was, this is fantastic. These were special places. And I think the same would be true in the

00:49:42.920 North, Harrogate or Blackpool. One of the saddest things I think that has happened over the last

00:49:48.280 20 to 25 years has been the absolute collapse of many towns which depended on a single industry,

00:49:58.720 in this case is tourism. But the same is true, say, about coalfield towns, or most of the steel towns.

00:50:07.300 And one of the things that I am most interested in, I'm really interested in, is the fact that a lot

00:50:15.560 of these towns, steel, shipping, coastal resorts, have died economically, and they have become quite

00:50:29.440 sad places. We thought for a long time, the way to deal with this problem was just about jobs. And

00:50:35.860 this was a labour issue. So we give people, we try and find people new jobs, and we create industrial

00:50:40.440 estates and so on. One of the things I think we have completely missed, and this is coming back to

00:50:46.740 your point about white Britons, is that alongside being, for example, a coal miner, it wasn't just the

00:50:56.680 job. You might spend six days underground, you know, and there you were in the heat, and you were

00:51:03.600 knocking out coal, and everybody looked the same, because everybody looked black, and so on. But the

00:51:09.820 thing that actually made your week was the fact that you were Secretary of the Miners Welfare.

00:51:16.160 That gave you status in that community. One of the things that's happened with all of these towns,

00:51:22.540 what you might call company towns, is all of that has been destroyed. And we can't replace that

00:51:28.120 by giving a man or a woman a job on a sort of windswept industrial estate, where he or she is working

00:51:35.820 next to somebody who doesn't live in the same village as them. They have to drive to work or

00:51:40.820 take the bus rather than walk to the work, the factory or the steelworks, and so on. And that

00:51:48.440 problem, actually, if you like to put it in these terms, is structurally a white problem. It is a

00:51:57.520 problem for white Britons who have that particular history. And we should recognise it as such,

00:52:05.000 because it's not just a straightforward economic problem. Remember what I said about what's taken

00:52:10.720 over, identity taking over? What has really struck most people, and that's why people in the so-called

00:52:18.020 red wall, I think, have defected from Labour, is that the Labour Party failed to recognise what working

00:52:26.980 people in this country lost when those industries and those towns changed. They didn't just lose jobs,

00:52:34.560 but they lost identity. So, for example, and I'll stop ranting about this in a second, but I can't tell

00:52:39.960 you how strongly I feel about it, because I've met a lot of these people there. You know, I have family

00:52:44.400 who live in the Midlands. One of the things that you see is a sadness of parents who lived in the

00:52:55.500 same village as their own parents and worked in the same factory or mill or whatever it is,

00:53:00.580 whose parents lived in that village and worked in the same factory. So there's three or four

00:53:04.940 generations. And now suddenly, these people, their children are nowhere near them, because they've had

00:53:11.780 to move away to have a job in a city somewhere. If they want to see their grandchildren, they have to

00:53:16.900 get in the car and drive an hour. Whereas, you know, their own grandparents could just walk around the

00:53:22.940 corner. I think we haven't yet grasped in this country the absolute trauma that the 80s and the

00:53:33.600 90s visited on many parts of this country. And that's the problem of the political and media elite,

00:53:40.960 who are busy yapping about, you know, the fact that their children can't do exams this year and how

00:53:49.140 terrible it is, when these people's whole history and identity is crumbling in front of their faces.

00:53:58.080 Sorry, I'm ranting on about it, but I can't tell you how strongly I feel about it.

00:54:03.180 I'll be honest with you, Trevor, I'm really, really glad that we talked about this, because

00:54:07.400 like I said, I've worked in those types of communities. And it's something we simply don't

00:54:12.040 discuss. We demonise these people. They're thick, they're stupid, they voted Brexit, blah, blah, blah.

00:54:16.880 And it's like, you don't understand what it's like when everything that you value, your entire

00:54:21.980 sense of community has just been eroded over time. And the worst bit is no one cares. No one cares.

00:54:29.060 Because we're all based, all the liberal elite are all based in London, and they don't address

00:54:33.920 those problems because quite simply, they don't concern them. But I think I would go even deeper

00:54:39.020 than what you say. I think these people have felt that their dignity has been stolen from them.

00:54:46.560 And I think that's where a lot of anger comes from.

00:54:49.640 Completely. And if you don't mind, I will tell you how I got to this point. And it is

00:54:56.340 partly the answer to Constantine's earlier question about identity and the commonality.

00:55:04.520 identity. I really got to this point of thinking, not by looking first at white communities, but

00:55:12.440 looking at black communities in the United States. I was making a film about the preacher

00:55:18.280 Al Sharpton. And I went round some part of the northeast with him. I went to see him preach

00:55:30.100 in a church in a church in New Jersey. And hundreds of people came to hear him preach. He's a fantastic

00:55:37.340 preacher. He's a great performer, so on and so forth. But the thing that most struck me, and it brought

00:55:44.740 back my own childhood in many ways, was that black American churches are very formal. They have a

00:55:55.540 structure. There is a preacher. There are elders. There are stewards. And when people come out to church

00:56:03.140 in black churches, they've dressed in their best. It's an important moment of the week.

00:56:12.380 And I remember talking to a guy who was actually the chief steward in this church,

00:56:16.600 who I think most of the week is a janitor. But on Sunday, he is the chief steward of his church.

00:56:24.620 Hundreds of people defer to him. You don't get to sit down unless he or his team sit you down.

00:56:35.220 If the children need to go out to Sunday school, he's organizing. He is numero uno. And in that

00:56:43.720 community, he's got identity. He's got status. So he can afford to, you know, he doesn't mind the rest

00:56:51.800 of the week, that he's completely invisible to the white people who go in and out of the building

00:56:57.020 where he's a janitor. Because on Sunday, he's the guy. And I, I realized actually,

00:57:06.480 the clever people, the exam passing people like us, because our lives are fulfilled, we have status,

00:57:14.960 we are deferred to, you know, people don't, generally speaking, overlook us.

00:57:22.340 On this point, you're massively overestimating us.

00:57:27.240 I'd like to find someone who defers to me. It hasn't happened yet. Oh, there you go.

00:57:31.900 Anton, does Anton? No, no, he doesn't. He's just shaking his head.

00:57:34.840 That will be the opening of the interview, Trevor, just a black man bowing to me. That will make me look great.

00:57:40.380 I just assume that you have a large group of people who are not on camera, who are simply,

00:57:47.640 you know, in between coming in and brushing your face and, you know, rubbing your feet and all that.

00:57:54.040 I mean, what is wrong with you?

00:57:55.540 Anton, step your game up, man.

00:57:56.820 You're a rock star. You are rock stars of the medium. You should be treated as such.

00:58:04.320 But I interrupted you. I take your point, of course, that what you're really talking about,

00:58:08.880 I think, is the atomization of society, the destruction of community,

00:58:12.480 and the fact that people no longer have meaningful opportunities for status

00:58:17.780 outside of being on television, being on the radio, writing for newspapers, whatever else.

00:58:23.520 But your word, I think your word dignity is more important than any of that, actually.

00:58:28.820 I think you hit it right. It's about people's own dignity.

00:58:33.200 And I think we haven't grasped, when I say we here, I am talking about decision makers and opinion formers.

00:58:42.420 Because we haven't lost any of that, I don't think we have grasped how bigger loss it is

00:58:50.520 for millions of people in advanced societies.

00:58:54.360 Yeah. And it all goes back as well to globalization, this idea that, you know, that we are one, you know,

00:59:02.000 that we are all interconnected, that identity doesn't really matter because, you know, we're all European.

00:59:08.180 And it seems that that liberal elite just don't seem to be learning the lessons.

00:59:13.960 They don't learn the lesson of Brexit. They didn't learn the lesson of Trump.

00:59:17.260 And now with Biden elected, they think that that problem has gone away when it all Biden is,

00:59:22.760 is a skin graft on a festering wound.

00:59:26.680 Nice. Nice. I wish I thought that phrase.

00:59:29.960 He's used that line before. He did very well.

00:59:33.900 I tell you, I agree with that to an extent. I'll tell you what I think is an issue here.

00:59:40.080 I think a lot of us who are certainly in our 50s and 60s, who were the first in our families to go to university,

00:59:52.340 all that stuff, we, and I'm hesitating because I never like to get into the amateur psychology game,

01:00:01.580 but I think a lot of us are people who, in a way, got away from our family background.

01:00:12.080 We escaped what we were. I mean, for example, in my case, pretty much everybody in my family,

01:00:18.500 you know, my great-great-grandmother was a slave.

01:00:22.320 There's all sorts of things about my family which, you know, are humiliating and awful and so on.

01:00:29.760 Um, and pretty much everybody in my, my parents, my mother worked in a sweatshop,

01:00:35.840 my father basically worked in uniform, railway man, postman, all that, most of his life.

01:00:42.960 And the expectation was that we would all be in some kind of uniform, actually.

01:00:48.280 I was the last. I've never been in a uniform.

01:00:50.880 I escaped all of that, except when I was in the Salvation Army.

01:00:55.180 I've escaped all of that, you know, and I live a life

01:00:58.620 that wasn't just, isn't just different from my parents.

01:01:02.220 It was unimaginable to my parents.

01:01:04.980 They didn't even know people like me existed, if you see what I mean.

01:01:09.440 Um, so I think the problem is that people in our class,

01:01:15.260 because we escaped our past,

01:01:17.660 in a way, tend to treat other people who think their past is important and are still embracing it.

01:01:25.400 So, you know, they go around to their mum around the corner and so on.

01:01:28.920 And that is really important to them.

01:01:31.500 We kind of think that's all a bit,

01:01:34.060 it's a bit quaint, it's a bit old-fashioned, a bit backward.

01:01:37.660 But actually, that's what most people want for their lives.

01:01:41.940 And I think your point about globalisation is important,

01:01:46.260 but in a different way.

01:01:47.380 I think the problem is that the deracinated folks of our class

01:01:52.520 basically think people who aren't like us are essentially a bit backward.

01:01:59.580 When in fact, I think we are the ones who've suffered loss.

01:02:02.800 Maybe I feel differently about this,

01:02:06.040 because as I started this conversation by saying,

01:02:08.900 I come from a very big family, I love it to pieces.

01:02:13.380 You know, a lot of them think I'm a, you know, disagree with me politically,

01:02:18.180 and think, why has he gone over to the dark side?

01:02:21.280 But they would never for one second,

01:02:24.780 never for one second,

01:02:26.800 disrespect me, or hold me at a distance,

01:02:29.740 because that thing, that grandmother, great-grandmother,

01:02:34.860 great-great-grandmother holds us together.

01:02:37.520 And that's more important than any difference we might have

01:02:40.980 about the way the world works.

01:02:43.540 I think that the big losers at the moment, actually,

01:02:48.520 are the people who run things,

01:02:50.560 because they've lost that feeling,

01:02:53.000 and they try to impose their way of thinking,

01:02:59.300 which they say is modern,

01:03:01.500 you know, the woke thing,

01:03:02.940 on everybody else.

01:03:04.600 And everybody else is saying,

01:03:06.560 no, don't fancy it.

01:03:09.460 We can be perfectly civilized,

01:03:11.160 and like other people,

01:03:12.680 and, you know,

01:03:14.000 we have gay brothers and sisters and nieces

01:03:16.960 and sons and daughters.

01:03:18.480 That doesn't mean we've got to go all kind of mad about it.

01:03:25.060 In fact, in a way,

01:03:27.020 it's the people who are making a big deal of this

01:03:29.160 who are the mad ones.

01:03:30.980 The people who say,

01:03:33.780 okay, oh, such and such is going to,

01:03:35.700 you know, my niece is going to bring her wife round,

01:03:37.920 and nobody blinks an eyelid.

01:03:40.420 That is what equality looks like.

01:03:42.820 Not, oh my God,

01:03:44.320 we've got to have something

01:03:45.620 that will make sure that Dee feels comfortable.

01:03:47.600 What will make Dee feel comfortable

01:03:49.740 is nobody talking about the fact that Dee's a lesbian.

01:03:53.900 Right, right.

01:03:55.660 So, I get a, you know,

01:03:57.920 I'm really enjoying our conversation.

01:03:59.620 I wish we had more time,

01:04:00.720 and hopefully when the lockdown is over,

01:04:02.620 we can get you in the studio.

01:04:04.240 I'm ranting on.

01:04:07.140 No, on the contrary, Trevor,

01:04:09.280 I just wish we could talk to you for much longer.

01:04:13.680 I get a sense that you're quite optimistic about the future.

01:04:19.220 Are you?

01:04:22.240 Yeah.

01:04:23.960 Yeah, I'm a believer.

01:04:25.340 And see, well, one of,

01:04:26.860 I'm about to say something,

01:04:28.520 which I did not start this interview meaning to say,

01:04:31.040 and it's a tribute to your skill as interviewers,

01:04:34.820 because I've sat in your seat

01:04:36.900 and not been able to do this.

01:04:39.640 But I'm very optimistic.

01:04:41.540 I'm a great,

01:04:42.860 I'm a believer in lots of different ways.

01:04:44.860 I was brought up in the church.

01:04:50.920 I'm not about to give you a sermon,

01:04:52.820 but I was brought up in the church.

01:04:55.520 And one of the fundamental things

01:04:57.120 about being our type of Christian,

01:05:01.640 particularly, I suppose,

01:05:02.360 if you come from our kind of background,

01:05:05.400 slavery, colonialism, so on,

01:05:08.060 is that faith is not some sort of,

01:05:13.480 you know,

01:05:14.660 warm, fuzzy blanket where you hide from reality.

01:05:19.260 It's exactly the opposite.

01:05:21.920 Faith is entirely tied up with hope.

01:05:25.820 I was brought up believing

01:05:27.420 that there is a better world

01:05:29.760 and that actually part of our business

01:05:32.860 is to realise that better world

01:05:36.120 as far as we can

01:05:37.340 right here in this world.

01:05:41.660 And that if you don't believe that,

01:05:45.400 that there can be that better world,

01:05:47.260 what possible incentive is there for you

01:05:48.880 to want to bother to make things change?

01:05:51.500 Well, I'm a great believer,

01:05:54.200 not only that it's your business,

01:05:57.120 it's your duty

01:05:57.960 to try to create that better world,

01:06:00.900 but that actually it's entirely possible.

01:06:04.700 I mean, that's what I've always believed.

01:06:08.300 And I guess I will go to my grave

01:06:10.460 believing that.

01:06:12.020 I don't,

01:06:12.980 it's one of the reasons that

01:06:13.940 when, you know,

01:06:14.640 we're talking about race,

01:06:16.300 I just absolutely don't buy this

01:06:19.900 nonsensical,

01:06:23.320 supposedly critical race theory idea

01:06:27.640 that all people of a particular colour

01:06:30.440 are intrinsically evil.

01:06:32.640 You can never get rid of racism

01:06:34.420 or its effects, rather.

01:06:36.500 You can never do anything

01:06:38.180 unless, I don't know,

01:06:40.040 you get rid of everybody

01:06:41.240 who you don't like.

01:06:42.920 I think that's just,

01:06:44.740 that is the counsel of despair.

01:06:46.740 You know,

01:06:46.960 might as well just go and slash your wrists, mate.

01:06:49.740 I'm,

01:06:51.460 I always

01:06:52.780 argue with my Labour Party friends.

01:06:55.580 why are you a socialist?

01:06:58.820 If you don't believe

01:06:59.840 in,

01:07:01.100 in something,

01:07:03.320 in the possibility of a better future,

01:07:05.460 why are you a socialist?

01:07:06.560 I mean,

01:07:06.760 why are you bothering?

01:07:07.940 Why do you just stay at home?

01:07:10.320 You've got to believe

01:07:11.240 that it is possible

01:07:12.400 for things to change.

01:07:14.580 Otherwise,

01:07:15.320 why bother to try to do anything

01:07:17.960 about where we are?

01:07:20.240 Sermon over.

01:07:21.780 No,

01:07:22.260 it's,

01:07:23.100 look,

01:07:23.440 Trevor,

01:07:23.920 it's been an absolute honour

01:07:24.860 having you on.

01:07:25.580 As I say,

01:07:26.020 I hope we can get you back

01:07:27.080 once the lockdown's over

01:07:28.480 because there's so much more

01:07:29.480 we could talk about.

01:07:31.520 But we are out of time.

01:07:33.120 We are out of time.

01:07:34.060 It's been a genuine pleasure.

01:07:35.580 And I,

01:07:36.040 I know that both I,

01:07:37.500 Francis and I,

01:07:38.180 but also a lot of our audience

01:07:39.360 will appreciate

01:07:40.080 the balanced

01:07:41.800 and sensible view

01:07:43.040 you have on many of these issues.

01:07:44.480 I really,

01:07:44.940 I really fundamentally believe that.

01:07:46.900 But we've got one more question

01:07:48.020 before we let you go.

01:07:49.160 Which is,

01:07:49.720 what is the one thing

01:07:50.980 we're not talking about

01:07:51.980 but we really should be?

01:07:55.480 Yeah,

01:07:55.940 well,

01:07:56.140 you know,

01:07:56.540 I write for the time.

01:07:58.720 I mean,

01:07:59.120 you know,

01:07:59.380 my day job is

01:08:00.280 I run some businesses

01:08:01.280 and that's really great fun.

01:08:03.880 And,

01:08:04.200 and I'm trying to get people

01:08:05.700 to apply science to politics.

01:08:08.220 So maybe,

01:08:09.280 you know,

01:08:09.600 if I were a serious person,

01:08:10.660 I'd give you a lecture

01:08:12.160 about all that.

01:08:13.040 But actually,

01:08:14.920 the things,

01:08:15.660 and I,

01:08:16.000 you know,

01:08:16.220 I know I have this reputation

01:08:17.220 for being supposedly controversial.

01:08:19.440 I think that's all nonsense.

01:08:20.880 I'm sure I've said something

01:08:21.960 that somebody will regard

01:08:22.920 as controversial.

01:08:23.980 But the things that really matter,

01:08:26.360 here is the thing

01:08:27.240 I've written about

01:08:28.400 in the last year,

01:08:29.160 which I think is the most

01:08:29.940 controversial thing,

01:08:30.980 which nobody seems to want

01:08:31.980 to talk about.

01:08:34.600 Was Miles Davis

01:08:36.300 a better trumpeter

01:08:38.520 than Wynton Marsalis?

01:08:39.760 Now this is a thing

01:08:42.180 that people could

01:08:43.900 and should get into a fight about

01:08:45.440 because that's a serious question.

01:08:47.980 A lot of these other things,

01:08:49.800 but that is a reality.

01:08:51.660 Miles threw Wynton

01:08:53.720 off the stage

01:08:55.900 at a jazz festival

01:08:57.200 because he just hated

01:08:58.600 this little upstart.

01:09:01.640 But though Miles Davis

01:09:03.500 is one of the greatest musicians ever,

01:09:06.600 Wynton is probably

01:09:07.800 the greatest instrumentalist

01:09:09.220 of the last hundred years.

01:09:11.880 Discuss.

01:09:13.320 Well, there you go.

01:09:14.360 We're finishing the interview

01:09:15.460 on a very divisive note.

01:09:17.940 Trevor Phillips,

01:09:18.820 thank you so much

01:09:19.780 for coming on the show

01:09:20.680 and thank you all

01:09:22.000 for watching at home.

01:09:23.140 We will see you very soon

01:09:24.560 with another episode

01:09:25.400 like this one.

01:09:26.240 Absolutely.

01:09:26.760 And they all go out

01:09:27.320 at 7pm UK time.

01:09:28.820 Take care and see you soon, guys.

01:09:30.240 We'll see you soon, guys.

01:09:30.880 See you soon, guys.

01:09:31.260 Bye bye!

01:09:31.760 Bye bye!

01:09:35.760 Bye bye!

01:09:40.260 Bye bye!

01:09:45.840 Bye bye!

01:09:47.680 Bye bye!

01:09:52.360 Bye bye!

01:09:54.400 Bye bye.

01:09:55.860 Bye bye.

01:09:56.360 Bye bye.

01:09:59.140 Bye bye!

TRIGGERnometry - February 28, 2021

Trevor Phillips：＂We Live in the Age of Gangster Politics＂

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