Friday Night Comedy from BBC Radio 4 - The News Quiz: Ep4. Conference & Confidence

Episode Date: October 4, 2024

Robin Morgan, Ian Smith, Alice Fraser, and Ash Sarkar join Andy Zaltzman to quiz the news.This week on The News Quiz the panel plough through Keir Starmer's first Labour conference as PM, analyse the effectiveness of the UN, and celebrate the coming of Earth's new moon... All hail Moon 2!Written by Andy ZaltzmanWith additional material by: Jade Gebbie, Mark Granger, Sharon Wanjohi, and Christina Riggs Producer: Sam Holmes Executive Producer: James Robinson Production Coordinator: Jodie Charman Sound Editor: Marc WillcoxA BBC Studios Audio Production for Radio 4 An Eco-Audio certified Production

This is the BBC. This podcast is supported by advertising outside the UK. Hello, I'm Sumi Somosganda from the Global Story Podcast. Kamala Harris and Donald Trump offer two very different views on climate change. One of them will lead the world's greatest producer of fossil fuels and have the power to reshape global climate action. So what would a Harris or Trump presidency mean for the climate crisis? The Global Story brings you fresh takes and smart perspectives from BBC journalists around the world. Find us wherever

you get your podcasts. BBC Sounds, music, radio radio podcasts. This is an appeal for calm. I'm Andy Zoltzman. Please send in any spare bits of calm that you don't need. With the world in its current agitated state, any calm you can donate will help. Maybe you can spare a nice cup of tea, a 10-minute sit-down with a colouring book and a snoozing dog. Don't draw on the dog.

Or even an old video of Michael Atherton batting stoically for a draw that the UN could project onto the skies above the Middle East. APPLAUSE Proper cricket, nature's purest balm. And to do our bit, here is our specially calmed version of the news quiz. Welcome to the news quiz. I am Andy Zoltzman.

Just quickly, after the Wi-Fi hack at stations this week that resulted in people logging into station Wi-Fi, receiving a bogus warning about a fictitious terror attack, I'm a bit worried that my script might have been hacked and tampered with, but I'll worry about that after I've finished explaining why sport is a waste of time and balding, lapsed Jewish comedians have no place on radio... Hang on, hang on. Our teams this week as the UN meets in New York

and with health warnings over vegan dairy products, our teams are Team Give Peace a chance and Team Give Cheese a pass. On Team Peace, we have Alice Fraser and Robin Morgan. CHEERING AND APPLAUSE And on Team Cheese, Ian Smith and contributing editor at Navara Media, Ash Sarker. CHEERING AND APPLAUSE Following more complaints about the imprecise scoring system on the news quiz, I will just be awarding a grade to our teams as we go through the show and if they're

not happy at the end they can do a reset. Right we'll start at the Labour conference with our first question and it's a missing words question and this can go to Alice and Robin first. Labour leader Keir Starmer in his first conference speech since becoming Prime Minister promised that he offered no answers or hope. Are there words missing and if so, what are they? There aren't any words missing, that was completely true. He leaned into the lacto and was like, and you got a problem with that? He's gone really bolshy now.

He's very confident. It's the changed Labour Party. It's very, very exciting. Now he said there's no easy answers and he couldn't offer false hope. Correct, yes. It's an odd thing. He's made a lot of promises.

He said, Labour's going to do a crackdown on knife crime, give a real living wage, modern industrial strategy, a 10-year plan for the NHS, devolution for the nation's regions and cities, the biggest levelling up of workers' rights in a generation, more teachers, more neighbourhood police, more operations, rebuilding the public service. And all he asks in exchange is £23,000 worth of Cravats as free gifts. He was on a Tuesday, wasn't he? He was on a Tuesday afternoon, and then they left West Streeting on the Wednesday in the Glastonbury Legend slot. I really enjoyed his speech. I thought it was quite... I enjoyed David Lammy's speech on the Sunday. That was quite nice.

He said Britain is back. He said he's been going around the world telling other world leaders that Britain is back which given our history Suggesting the Empire is back. There was a film about that So when he said Britain is back, did you start to get the sense that around the world? Everyone just said to each other nail everything down As what as a political writer, what did you make of the whole Labour Congress? Only a few months into their term of office after 14 years in opposition and yet they seem to be oddly fractious. Yeah, it was weirdly fractious. I mean, the thing which is really funny about Keir Starmer is that when he's not punching left in his own party, he really doesn't

know what to do. So when journalists are saying, hey, like, were those like £20,000 worth of suits, was that really necessary? Did you have to stay in the £18 million penthouse? He's like, I absolutely did. And it's actually quite rude to my children that you would stress that it wasn't fair and upstanding. And it means that that difference that he played on for years, which is I'm not Boris Johnson, is really starting to melt away. And if he turned out tomorrow to have like seven more unidentified children, I'd be like, yeah, that tracks. Can I just say one thing? I've been told online a lot recently that apparently I look like a young,

secure star man. So if there is a child around, I'm going to get some of those... LAUGHTER I'm going to get some hand-me-down fleeces is what I'm going to get. You could take the Labour government down. If you just said you're one of his illegitimate kids, no-one would do a DNA test. Like, yeah, I'll buy that.

He's got a new catchphrase, which I think is very clever, because the catchphrase is, change begins. But he hasn't specified when or who is doing it, just says change at some point will begin. But he's I think made it very clear he's not gonna be starting that or it will go very slowly. I mean it was you know it was a set piece speech at a conference so it's bound to be a bit vague and a bit general. I mean looking for policy detail in the set piece speech is a bit like looking for a dolphin in a haystack It would be easy to spot if it was there, but it's unrealistic to expect any

Do you think they're starting to make their plans for the country a bit clearer ash? Well, I think that there was always a plan right and the plan was phase one during the election you say we're not gonna Have these kinds of tax rises. Phase two, you get into office and you go, oh, we had to look under the hood and it's so much worse than we thought it was going to be. And then phase three is you've got a budget coming along where it's like, okay, we're going to magic some money out of a hat, maybe change some Bank of England rules. And like, what do you know?

Maybe we have to do some tax rises as well. And it was quite obvious from the start, but what's wonderful about British journalism is that you've got this whole layer of very elite, very well-paid journalists whose only job is to comment on current affairs like they've just been kicked in the head by a mule. It's like, oh, this is so surprising. Who could have seen this coming? Oh, they're saying it's worse under the hood.

Like, oh, now tax rises. What a surprise. And it's like, oh, wow. That does sort of make sense because Keir Starmer grew up on a donkey farm didn't he so that's obviously where the mules were coming from I think that sounds like my dad it sounds it sounds like you've misheard tool and mule my dad was a mule maker they very quickly cut the winter fuel allowance so they lost a vote at the conference whether they approve of the fuel allowance or not. What I didn't realise is how that vote happens. It's a woman asking who's for, then everyone puts their hands up and in the space of two

seconds she just goes, okay, and against and then the hands up again yeah I think that's against yeah it just seems bizarre that we're still doing counting hands right I mean unless you guys think it's good I'm hands up first also I feel like there's an obvious solution here so a lot of money was spent on Rwanda, which is very warm. We send the pensioners to Rwanda. All the infrastructure has been set up to send the pensioners to Rwanda, and then we can put people seeking asylum in all people's homes. What? Tell me a negative.

Ian, your plans never have negatives. Thank you. Another question on conference for Ashen. Ian, Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves claimed the government will make Britain the best place to start a what? I wanted to say fight but I think it's business. Well it could be both actually but business is the correct answer, yes. And you know, internally you're kind of trying to rebuild business confidence. Do you sense that, is business behind labour? Well, I mean, this is the kind of funny thing about labour strategy, which is on the one

hand they're like, we really, really need private investment. We need international investment in this country. And on the other hand, they've been spending the last, you know, few months going, Britain's really shit. Like, we're completely up a creek. Like, please don't expect any good things to happen because they won't. last few months going, Britain's really shit. We're completely up a creek. Please don't expect any good things to happen because they won't.

So if you're an international investor, you're a bit like, I don't really know if I want to put my money here. So over conference, I think there was a memo that went out which was like smile more and sound more upbeat. So during the chancellor's speech, it was like, I really do believe in Britain. We're capable of great things.

Not those things that you want, but different things. Cheaper things. Look, we've got Gary Neville. Ian, what do you think Britain is the best place to start? If you had to finish that sentence, Britain is the best place to start. A conga line directly over the White Cliffs of Dove. Yes, this was indeed party conferences and the annual

festival of fixed smiles precisely express vagueness and parties taking on their own fiercest rivals themselves. Starmer has stated his willingness to be unpopular and to be fair to him it's very good to see a politician make such a determined effort to live up to a promise for once. So let's move on now to a bit more detail on what was said. A new government bill could require who to snoop into whose what? A new government bill could require Keir Starmer to snoop into everybody's wardrobes and pick what he likes the best. Is this banks can snoop into benefits claimants' bank accounts, is that correct?

In case they are on the take? It's interesting Isn't it? It's Thomas said he wanted to get more people back to work and it's already had an effect But could one person has Phillips go fills back on TV Cannot keep a good man down You've clearly never wrestled against a pope In my hometown of Gould, I saw my best bit of benefit fraud. Saw a man on a mobility scooter get an egg thrown at him

and then get up off the mobility scooter, run after the kid... LAUGHTER ..and punch that kid in the face. That's what happens in Gould. You get to see benefit fraud live. LAUGHTER face. That's what happens in Gull, you get to see benefit fraud live. There's a man in Gull who's been claiming benefits has been decapitated, but he's got away with it because he just stuffs his head into his shirt for his passport photo.

Another thing emerging from the Labour conference, the government has said it wants fewer women to do what? They want fewer women to be an afterthought to men. And speaking of men, aren't men great, Auntie? I really feel like there's been loads throughout history, Henry VIII, Henry VII, they could go on. Fewer women to use exclamation marks in work emails. Is that a typically feminine trait? I love an exclamation mark. Maybe that's because you're a new man, so you know this is a feminine quality but it's definitely that thing of like okay I just you know I'd really like it if you

paid me the 600 pounds that you owe me but no worries if not. Any other questions? Alice? Time? Yes. The answer is due time. They want fewer women in prisons because apparently not only is it likely to lead to further criminalization and self-harm, it's also highly unflattering to be in prison. It's not working for women, according to Shabana Mahmood. Everyone from a cool winter to a highly saturated fall color palette. It's really washed out by a ten stretch. So yeah this is Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood announcing measures to reduce the number of women in prison on the rather spurious grounds that all the evidence

shows that for most women offenders prison is ineffective, inappropriate, counterproductive, dangerous, damaging and expensive but apart from that it works a birthday treat. But politically it's always a tricky thing for government sir. I think it's always difficult because people have this natural sense of fairness which is if you've done something wrong you should be punished. But every time you take someone out of their community and into a prison it's like you create a tear in the social fabric right so more damage happens. If you take a woman into prison the likelihood is that she's going to be somebody's primary caregiver. Two-thirds of women who are in prison are survivors of domestic violence and disproportionately their

care experienced as well. So the kind of damage that you're creating, it has this ripple out effect to lots of other people, including children. When you render a child without primary caregiver, that's a really expensive problem for states. So I think that yes, this might rub up against people's sense of fairness but ultimately it's always thing. I realize there were no jokes in that, I'm so sorry. What about if whenever someone commits a crime they get to nominate one friend or family member to go into prison with them and that's non-negotiable? So yeah you've been chosen to go into prison with Karen,

and you don't even have to know them, you pick a celebrity. Just to make it so that people aren't by themselves. Well that would make sense. Also, obviously prisons breed crime like Catholic rabbits, so actually one of the great problems with prisons in terms of reoffending is there are not enough innocent people in jail. More than 50% of the prison population is innocent, then by sheer force of personality, they will cure everyone else of crime. Or also, if lots of people are reoffending, why don't we make less things illegal? So when they come out of prison and do those things, we're like, well that's not illegal,

you can set fire to whatever you want. I feel like I'm suggesting a lot of good stuff here. How did you get to see a sociology teacher who said that in all seriousness, like, lesson one, module one of like crime and punishment, he was like, how would you get rid of crime tomorrow? And this one girl was like, get rid of all the laws, sir. And he was like, bingo. I mean, I do have a good solution, which is that for all women, in order to stop them sort of costing the prisons money, what you need to do is put them under house arrest, right? And so I suggest you don't even need to give them the ankle bracelet,

just give them a two-and-a-half-year-old. And they will plan to go out in 15 minutes, and they will still be at home four years from now. Right. And to merge my idea, it can be a two and a half year old of their choice. Let's move on to the obvious highlight of the conference. This comes in the form of a true or almost true question. Is this true or almost true?

Addressing the Middle East crisis, Keir Starmer called for the return of fish fingers. Almost true. Correct. Yes, it was almost true. What did he actually say? He said sausages. Yes. Which I thought was a profound misunderstanding of both an Islamic culture and a Jewish one. Yes. I mean it was a, clearly, I think it was a slip of the clearly, I think it was a slip of the tongue. Do we think it was a slip of the tongue? No, it was inevitable. This is what happens when you have a hotel continental breakfast

three days on the trough. That's too much eggs and bacon. It's too much processed food. It's happened all the time. Liz Truss started going on about pork markets. Keir Starmer has now banged on about sausages. It didn't get reported on, but Wes Streeting finished his speech with Liz Truss started going on about pork markets. Keir Starmer has now banged on about sausages. It didn't get reported on,

but Wes Streeting finished his speech with, give me a dippy egg, I want a dippy egg. I like that he didn't technically correct himself. He just said hostages afterwards. So he didn't go, sausages, oh, sorry, what am I saying? So it sounded like the start of a list I demand the return of the sausages hostages mashed potato it's very odd I thought it was a possessive on the sausages so it was the hostages of the

sausages return of the sausages is not my favorite of the trilogy. Hello, I'm Sumi Somosganda from the Global Story Podcast. Kamala Harris and Donald Trump offer two very different views on climate change. One of them will lead the world's greatest producer of fossil fuels and have the power to reshape global climate action. So what would a Harris or Trump presidency mean for the climate crisis? The Global Story brings you fresh takes and smart perspectives from BBC journalists around the world.

Find us wherever you get your podcasts. Right, at the end of that round, we're doing a grading system this week. Alice and Robin have A- and Ash and Ian have a straight A. Right, now we have a special round looking at what former news quiz hosts are getting up to these days Some of them have been in the news this week So each of these questions deals with a former news quiz host and this comes in the form of a misleading headline So ash and Ian, what is the real story here? Sandy Toxvig marries Bjorn from ABBA Which is a bit of a surprise on various levels

Is it Marys officiating ceremony? Yes, there you go. Sandy Toxvig has officiated the marriage of Bjorn from ABBA and that makes me hugely excited that I could one day fulfill my dream of marrying off one of Buck's Fizz. Yeah, ABBA's Bjorn Ulvaeus has married his partner Christina Sass in a ceremony that was officiated by Sandy Toxvig, which is the gayest sounding news story to involve a straight couple getting married since Liza Minnelli went to Elizabeth Taylor's eighth wedding on Michael Jackson's Neverland estate.

If I was Sandy Toxvig, I'd have done it as a hologram, see how they like it. LAUGHTER APPLAUSE I found out that Bjorn has been married twice before as well, in weddings officiated by Simon Hoggart and Barry Tuck. LAUGHTER Do you think when they said, I do, the QI siren comes on? LAUGHTER Obvious answer.

Let's move on to another news quiz host, another misleading headline. Nish Kumar, who hosted the news quiz in early 2020, remains a long-shot outsider to be new leader of the Conservative Party. But the man who is current favourite, Robert Jenrick, had a bit of trouble this week trying to define what? Britishness, I think it is. I mean okay well the one thing he could say about Britishness is that it's been ruined by ethnic minorities and migrants. There's one thing that everyone can agree on, so that we're definitely the worst. I like how he looked at me as if I was going to go, uh yeah yeah.

He had so much to say in the green room. He's um he's the front runner isn't, for the probably going to get the Tory leadership? And obviously he's sort of to the right of the party, which means, I guess, that side of politics is now sort of a Robert Jenrick, Nigel Farage sausage fest. Sorry, hostage fest. I sort of don't understand what is England's national identity but a sort of a vague patchwork chorus of a thousand complaints about the weather in 400 different completely incomprehensible regional dialects, working vaguely in harmony towards a brighter future.

Crisp sandwiches. You don't get them in any other country. Because, you know, I look at it and like especially the really cheap crisps which are mostly fat and you have them in the cheap white bread and you crunch into it and a single tear rolls down my eye And you know, I can hear land of hope and glory Robert Jenrick's angry about this work whole meal bread that's coming Yeah, it's brown At the end of our news quiz host round, both teams are now on a B+.

Let's go across the Atlantic now. Keir Starmer, after leaving the party conference, popped across the pond to New York there as the United Nations issued further trademark resolutions including please stop and love heart emoji. The USA and France call for 21 days of what to happen and where. I guess that'll be ceasefire in Lebanon, in the south of Lebanon. So obviously there's been an outbreak of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah has been going on for some time with rockets being fired into Israel, displacement of tens of thousands of people,

and now there's airstrikes being launched on Beirut and preparations for a ground invasion. I mean, there's nothing funny about it, but you have all the sort of wagging fingers from Washington and Westminster going on. Netanyahu, will you please stop? And he's just like, no, I will not. Because, yeah, this sort of threatens

to create a big regional conflict, which is very bad for everybody apart from Netanyahu's cabinet, because it gives them a stay of execution. Ian, you've never been Secretary General of the United Nations, yet. Not for want of trying. That's a personal goal of yours. I mean, any suggestions what the UN might want to do? Well, they should heed the wise words of Russia, who called for an immediate cessation of hostilities. And I imagine they did that while giggling to themselves. You'd be like, this is cheeky of us.

I think what I'd want to bring up is why the days of a ceasefire are so specific. 21 days. It's a very specific number. Personally I'll be more in favor of not a 21 day ceasefire but a 21 millennium ceasefire which might be enough time for everyone to calm down. Do you think is that enough or do we need a bit more than that? I reckon on the hour of the end of the 21st millennium you're gonna hear the sound chk chk chk. That might be the most depressing thing anyone's said. In fact, the Secretary

General Antonio Guterres said, a united Security Council can make a tremendous difference for peace. Now, given that the five permanent members of the Security Council are the UK, France, USA, China and Russia, can you tell me something that is about as likely to happen as unity between those five countries? Someone running the London Marathon but not telling you that they're going to run the London Marathon. That really puts things in perspective. I've got something that I think would unite those countries.

It's immature but farts are funny farting is funny little whoopee cushion under the German Chancellor's seat he goes on it big old fart noise pewting straight on the phone let's withdraw the troops Keir Starmer's already making a joke, sounds like Schultz is already withdrawing his troops. They're laughing, having fun. So yeah, maybe just bring a load of whoopee cushions into the UN. The five members of the Security Council, the reason why they're the US, UK, France, Russia, China, is because they all were on the winning side of World War II. And it's like when you make friends on holiday and you realise you've got nothing in common afterwards.

And they're like, oh, you know, shall we keep in touch? And it's like, no, no, not really. It's also not just that, but then for the next 70 years you spend a lot of your time trying to kill each other. There's another quote from Antonio Guterres, the Secretary General, describing the UN, said, we have no power, we have no money, but we have a voice. But I'm in that situation. I've got no power, I've got no money, I can speak. I'm not getting involved in these things. I think the UN's a bit like Father Christmas. It would be nice if more people believed in it, but like Father Christmas

it's hard to take him seriously without a strong military presence. We have no money, we have no power, but we have a voice. Sounds like what the Guardian does, to try and get you to pay them. Like when the UN ambassador from Slovenia, he's the rotating president, he condemned the poisonous mood at the UN to which the ambassador from Italy said, maybe we wouldn't be in such a poisonous mood if you'd pitched in your share of the cheque after the diplomatic dinner Slovenia, to which the ambassador from Slovenia said, I loathe going Dutch, to which the Dutch ambassador smashed a porcelain windmill covered in clogs and took his shirt off and then the transcript stopped after that.

Israel has rejected a 21-day ceasefire proposed by the USA and France and endorsed by Team GB. Israel boss Benjamin Netanyahu extended a firm middle finger to the concept of compromise as the year-long game of atrocity tennis continues. I think this delicate, intractable and nuanced situation needs Benjamin Netanyahu, very much like a paddling pool needs a piranha. In other words, not at all unless you want everyone to have to flee for their lives as quickly as possible. Right, at the end of that round both teams are back up to A-. We finish this week's show with a special round. A number of biblical prophecies have come true this week. Admittedly, they're prophecies from this, the recently discovered gospel

according to St Alvin, unearthed by archaeologists last month in a fly-tipped sports hold all on the outskirts of Hemel Hempstead. But still, a biblical prophecy is a biblical prophecy. Our panelists, I have to tell me how this prophecy ends. Wars will rage, rich men will do ill, words will have no meaning, and then the gasping world will at last receive the second. The second course at this fancy restaurant. Why do they think we want to spend 45 minutes chit chatting between not enough entree and too much main It's good answer, but it's not correct. Any other yes, and we'll receive the second Neville brother Phil Neville Not the correct answer Yes, we're gonna get a second moon second moon send all the astrology girls crazy

It's a little asteroid which still seems quite big to me if we're counting it as a moon. It's getting pulled into the Earth's orbit so for I think it's like a month and a bit. Spare moon. Yeah quite exciting though isn't it? It is exciting. Say what you want about starma but you said change is so arrogant. What's your name? The moon. The moon is so arrogant. The moon is so arrogant. The moon is so arrogant. The moon is so arrogant.

The moon is so arrogant. The moon is so arrogant. The moon is so arrogant. The moon is so arrogant. The moon is so arrogant. The moon is so arrogant. The moon is so arrogant What's your name? The moon? I am THE moon

So I think we need to come up with a name for the moon now because it isn't just the moon It can't be called the moon too I can't believe this like libertarian moon economics that you're coming up with. Oh the the free market will solve the moon's arrogance problem. It'll get competitive again and start, I don't know, giving women more periods. Like, I don't understand. You just wait for this rash of werewolves that come in every fortnight. Oh, God, yeah, there's going to be so many werewolves.

LAUGHTER Starmer, you've done it again! LAUGHTER The moon was discovered by NASA's Asteroid Terrestrial Impact Last Alert System. Why don't we have a first alert system? LAUGHTER

It's mad that that's the one that's picking asteroids up first, is the last alert. They're busy with enough time to go, Oh, God! You're not going to like this! LAUGHTER Right, so that means that Oh, God. You're not going to like this. LAUGHTER Right, so that means that Ash and Ian are our winners this week with an A+. APPLAUSE

I'm sorry, you're very nice people, but suck on that. We don't have enough triumphalism from the winning sides on the news quiz. Thank you very much for listening to the news quiz. I've been Andy Zoltzman. Goodbye. Taking part in the news quiz were Ash Sarker, Alice Fraser, Ian Smith and Robin Morgan. In the chair was me, Andy Zoltzman. An additional material was written by Christina Riggs, Jade Geby, Mark Granger and Sharon Wanjohe. The producer was Sam Holmes and it was a BBC Studios audio production for Radio 4.

I'm Helena Bonham Carter and for BBC Radio 4 this is History's Secret Heroes. A new series of rarely heard tales from World War II. None of them knew that she'd lived this double life. They had no idea that she was Britain's top female codebreaker. We'll hear of daring risk takers. What she was offering to do was to ski in over the high Carpathian mountains in minus 40 degrees. Of course it was dangerous, but danger was his friend.

Helping people was his blood. Subscribe to History's Secret Heroes on climate change. One of them will lead the world's greatest producer of fossil fuels and have the power to reshape global climate action. So what would a Harris or Trump presidency mean for the climate crisis? The Global Story brings you fresh takes and smart perspectives from BBC journalists around the world. Find us wherever you get your podcasts.