Friday Night Comedy from BBC Radio 4 - The News Quiz - Friday 23rd October 2020

Episode Date: October 23, 2020

A satirical review of the week's news with Andy Zaltzman and guests Anand Menon, Chris McCausland, Lucy Porter and Sara Barron.It's the last in the present series as Andy and some oven-ready teams tackle Trump and Tiers and try to predict some future news.Written by Andy Zaltzman with additional material by Max Davis, Alice Fraser and Mike Shephard.Producer: Richard Morris A BBC Studios Production

This is the BBC. This podcast is supported by advertising outside the UK. BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I am Andy Zaltzman. Not for the first time in 2020, it has been a week that has really emphasised once again to us exactly why it is that Radio 4 always takes the precaution of bleeping out the first six words of the news.

So, for the last time in this ridiculous year, welcome to the News Quiz. We are recording this, as you hear, with a live online audience on a giant Zoom call, so can everyone please remember, assume your video is on. Right. Has everyone put it away? Then let's begin by meeting our two teams.

And in a week in which blame has been thrown around like an arthritic 93-year-old nun who mistakenly entered a professional wrestling competition, we have Team Blame against Team Recrimination. On Team Blame, it's Anand Menon and Lucy Porter. And on Team Recrimination, Sarah Barron and Chris McCausland. And we begin in time on a tradition with question one, and this goes to both teams.

Who has not been united with which city? Well, this will be the government and Boris Johnson and his team having a little bit of a tussle with Andy Burnham in Manchester, will it? Correct. Yeah, the government seems to now believe that the best way of slowing down the spread of coronavirus might be to create an overwhelming sense

of inter-regional resentment. And what they've done is they've meticulously, meticulously manufactured a mechanism for creating such levels of resistance by implementing a three-tier system where the third tier seems to be lucky dip. Put your hand in, have a rummage around, see what you get out, Andy.

That's what's happening, isn't it? That is fundamentally correct. Two points, correct. I don't know if this is a controversial opinion, but I do want to say that you have to hand it to Boris Johnson because it's a real achievement to have turned a scouser into a hero in Manchester. I should also just, Andy, quickly flag at the outset here that although I've lived here now, it's been almost a decade, I still don't fully understand certain bits of British life. So most of what I've learned about the North-South divide has come from this historical drama called Game of Thrones. So just keep that in mind with everything I offer up

from here on out. If anything, Game of Thrones underplays it. If anything. Yeah, because Andy Burnham is King of the North now, isn't he, in a Game of Thrones style. King of the North, but in a cagoule. I love it. The problem is that the Prime Minister thinks he's welcome to it.

So, you know, it's fine. He's not just the mayor, though, is he? Apparently he's the Metro Mayor. Now, I'd never heard this term before, but I seem to be hearing it ten times a day now, Metro Mayor. And I'm thinking maybe they should just go one step further and just call them Metro Man. Yeah, cos there is a difference between...

Cos my grandfather-in-law, my husband's grandad, was the mayor of Exeter, but like an old-fashioned gold chains kind of mayor, which my husband's a bit posher than me. When I met him, he said to me, he said, oh, of course my grandfather was a mayor. And I was like, oh, God, yes, so was mine. He was an alcoholic, total mayor.

But Andy Burnham's a proper, he's doing good mayoring. This is like textbook mayoring, isn't it? Because for me it's from American movies like superhero stuff and the mare is meant to be kind of angry and kind of sort of a bit pugnacious and he's doing that very well I think. He's being a good angry mare.

But he does need to get his eyes tested judging from that clip of him squinting at that phone because that was a bit painful. Alan, you've been brought on the show as the source of all wisdom for humanity. What is the correct way to deal with a pandemic as it currently stands? I think I'm putting you on the spot there. Let me just say, I think our politicians have been a bit pants on all sides when it comes to this crisis. I mean, Boris Johnson has obviously been quite pants.

But then if there's one thing that Labour don't want to do, it strikes me, is abuse the voters they want to get back. And what's the headline these days? You're all Tory scum. So that's not going to win them back. So everyone seems to be engaged in trying to do very, very badly. And it's a very good competition, it has to be said. Incidentally, I should just say, Andy, if I twitch at all, I'm just tucking in my shirt, so don't worry.

LAUGHTER That's why this show is never on the telly. I wonder where Boris Johnson's been getting some of the rules from, though, for what we can and can't do. And I think I was watching Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? And I think he's been watching it as well, because if you think of the parallels, you know, with the fines, it starts off low, £200, but every time you get another one, it doubles.

He doesn't want you going out and meeting anyone in person. He'd rather you phone a friend. And anyone with a persistent cough will be under extreme scrutiny. person, he'd rather you found a friend. And anyone with a persistent cough will be under extreme scrutiny. We know we're in trouble if we start asking Jeremy Clarkson what we should do. I'm very confused about the tiers as well. I don't know which one I'm in or what we're allowed to do. Because tier one seemed to be the coronavirus has to go to bed at 10. seemed to be the coronavirus has to go to bed at 10.

And then tier two is like now it's being sent to bed at nine with no supper to think about what it's done. And tier three, we're just going to take away its tablets and send it off to bed at eight. I don't know. Weirdly, though, tier three was different depending on where you are in terms of that. I don't know whether they were advised by the scientists, but Scouse coronavirus liked a bit of a gym.

It liked to go on the treadmill, whereas Lancashire coronavirus was a bit of a lazy bastard. So they could have the gyms open. And Wales is now just shut, isn't it? Because we've got Welsh... Hello, Welsh members of the audience. Hello! You see, it's nice to be able to connect with you

because I can't come and see you. I hope they are going to do it properly and just kind of have checkpoints on the Severn Bridge or at Chester Services. It seemed that the bickering over this deal came down to a shortfall of about £5 million, which in Boris Johnson money is one-tenth

of a non-existent bridge. Or... LAUGHTER £5 million also is a quarter of a thousandth of a percent of our national debt, which this week moonwalked through the £2 trillion barrier for the first time. Well done, everyone

involved. We can still do it in this country. £2 trillion barrier for the first time. Well done, everyone involved. We can still do it in this country. £2 trillion. That's hard to get your head around, that kind of number. I still get excited when I find a 20-pence piece in my next-door neighbour's bin. It makes all the rummaging worthwhile. I think that's going to put this squabbling into perspective. Maybe that's what Manchester should have done.

The people of Manchester should have just pretended to be a Tory donor who's just set up a PPE company. And then... I'd have loved to see the idea of looking at them going, it's just basically it's three million Mancunians in a very tall coat going, yes, no, I am James Dyson. I've just grown a bit taller since you last saw me. Got to find a way to get stuff done.

So, yeah, this is indeed the story on the latest squabbles between Westminster and the regions. Negotiations between Manchester and Westminster apparently founded irrevocably when neither side could agree who would have to keep Morrissey. Andy Burnham said that he would not accept a deal that will lead to increased levels of hardship and homelessness, prompting Boris Johnson to ask for a dictionary.

And the updated lockdown tier statuses apply from one minute past midnight on Saturday. That is such a menacing time to start anything. It's like a witch's spell, isn't it? It's very hard to say something will happen at one minute past midnight without cackling and summoning the forces of evil. So

that's two points to team recrimination and we move on to question two. This goes to both teams. What have millennials lost faith in? Is it A, the healing power of being condescended to by older generations about life, politics, the environment and avocados? Is it B, the prospect of Stonehenge ever having its roof finished? Is it C, democracy, D, love or E, snooker?

Andy, I'd like to go with, was it D, democracy? It was C, but I'll take your answer. I'll give you two points. There we go. And my feeling on that is like, isn't it just fair enough? Like, look what happened in the Bodie McBoatface vote. And anyway, I feel like the government really shouldn't be worried about it since millennials are too busy working overtime

to pay their extortionate rent to even be bothered to vote. And how do you... You've obviously been following the Brexit story through. How do you see the general state of democracy around Britain, around Europe, around the world right now? I have to say, my reaction when I saw this was, when I were a lad things were a lot harder than for you lot. We only had three TV channels. I didn't know what an avocado was

when I was young let alone that you should crush it. I mean if you can't be happy when you're 30 when you don't wake up with a sore back when your eyes work when your ears work you don't need a wee at four in the morning then you're never going to be happy to be quite honest. ears work, you don't need a wee at four in the morning and you're never going to be happy to be quite honest. This is the news that according to a survey from Cambridge Academics, sorry, let's use the correct media terminology, boffins, millennials

are less satisfied with democracy than any other generation. We should actually clarify that millennials refers to people born in the 1980s and early to mid-90s, also known as Generation Y. Sorry, I-90s, also known as Generation Y. Sorry, I read that wrong. Also known as Generation Y!

Then there's Generation Z, who are going to be followed by Generation Control Z, who want to undo absolutely everything. A bit of a joke for fans of computer keyboards. Is the next one Generation Control or Delete? The whole country's gone to the blue screen.

Turn it up on that again. We go on to our next question, which is for Sarah and Chris in Team Recrimination. What's red, blue, giving me nightmares and due to happen in less than two weeks? It's the US election. I don't want to talk about it. Let's bring on the American and have her talk about the most depressing thing she can imagine. And, you know, they're saying Biden's going to win in the polls.

But I feel like the polls, it feels ridiculous to take them seriously. However, they are the most reliable predictors we have now that the World Cup octopus is dead. There's been, I've been looking at various American websites. There's one called FiveThirtyEight where they do a lot of polling and they make a prediction. So at the moment, they're saying that the chances of Trump winning

are the same as the chances of it raining on any given day in LA. To sort of show you it's not that. I would personally prefer it if it was the same odds as it not raining on any given day in LA to sort of show you it's not that. I would personally prefer it if it was the same odds as it not raining on any given day in Manchester. It's also the idea that like the trouble, the trouble with surveying Trump supporters is that they tend to slam down the phone if they think the federal government is ringing them up and asking them for information. It's impossible to estimate the paranoid farmer with a bunker full of guns vote.

It is hard for us outsiders to understand, Sarah, American politics, because it seems to me that there are fundamentally three things in life you should never do. One, put Donald Trump in the White House. Two, put Donald Trump in the White House again. And three, pineapple on pizza.

And yet America seems oddly receptive to all of those three. I mean, I can't argue with any of that. You have to remember that I've moved over here. And I say that it was for love, but it was for free health care. Alan, I mean, the polls we've seen when it comes to Donald Trump are about as useful as facts in an argument against Donald Trump. And, you know, four years ago, Trump was trailing Hillary right up to polling day and indeed on polling day and after polling day by 2%. But crucially, he trailed her in a geographically advantageous way, thanks be to the wonders of democracy.

What are you expecting to happen this time? Well, firstly, the polls are a lot better this time because they've learned their lessons. But I mean, Donald Trump is going to lose. More people are going to vote for Joe Biden than vote for Donald Trump. That's absolutely clear. But it strikes me that he might just not move out, whatever happens. I mean, that strikes me as a danger of this American election is that he loses and says, yeah, well, I've got the key and I'm not going to move out. What are you going to do about it? And then you've got a real crisis on your hands. So you're fundamentally saying we burnt the White House down 206 years too early.

Well, I mean, you go through phases, don't you? Firstly, you say we won with the votes that were cast on the day because loads of Democrats are voting already and they'll say the postal votes don't count because they were all rigged. So firstly, it's only the votes for me that count. And secondly, if you lose that argument, you say, well, you know, try and get me out of here. He's probably going to, like, sew some prawns into the White House curtains before he goes.

Remove all the light fixtures. Chris, how have you found this year's American campaign? Have you been following it closely? I'm sorry, Andy, I've just found out the World Cup office is dead. I'm sorry, Andy, I've just found out the World Cup octopus is dead. I just need a few moments. Yes, indeed, this is the story of American democracy, the unstoppably bile-spewing juggernaut of weaponised rancour and cantrous vested interests chugging towards election day.

Less than two weeks to go now for Donald Trump, the undisputed Beethoven of bigotry, the Michelangelo of misanthropy, the Pablo Picasso of parochial prejudice, the... I think I've made the point. Oh, here's another one. The Craig Revel Hallward of crackpot reactionary hate-mongering. Still...

Still trailing... Still trailing in the opinion polls. But this time it could all come down to who came across least abysmally in the last debate this week, although it is far more likely to come down to voter suppression, manipulation of electoral rolls, the 110 million people who don't bother voting, the almost Britishly inane electoral system, a handful of carefully selected and ruthlessly partisan judges,

the weather, and the few million people who vote for other candidates, which is like betting in a two-horse race on a hot dog from the burger van. Let's move on. And this question goes to Anand and Lucy on Team Blame. What has turned out to be as oven-ready as a large wildebeest roaming through the Okavango Delta? I kind of feel like he's aiming this at me, Lucy. Well, it's your specialist subject, Adam, so I'll let you...

I mean, I know what it is, but I'd forgotten that Brexit was happening. It was like, during coronavirus, it's like having a toothache while your legs are on fire. Do you know what I mean? How do you know that? You can't see the bottom half of me, but I'm being very brave at the moment. So they're negotiating again. It's very, very exciting because no one's surprised. It was all a bit of pantomime this week.

And I confidently predict there'll be a deal. And I confidently predict it'll be a really bad deal. And that'll be that. Brexit will be over. But I would like to announce that I have sold Brexit for the Prime Minister and there's an easy solution to this. Oh right, this is very exciting. He should call it NHS Brexit because that works really, really well with test and trace. It's all about the branding. You just stick NHS in front of anything and all of a a sudden, it sounds really, really appealing.

And I think that's what they need to do for the next couple of months as they sell their Brexit deal. It's an NHS Brexit deal, and we'll love it. Right. There we go. There we go, problem solved. I still think one week on, one week off is a good compromise. I love the way, reading about the negotiations and how they're going,

though, I love the way Michael Gove has announced... Well, the door, about a week or so ago, was open to negotiations. Now it's just a jar. And I'm just thinking forward to next week when the door will be closed, but still on the latch. And then the week after, maybe it'll be closed, actually locked, but you'll find a key outside

under the big pebble behind the third plant pot, kind of. Yes, well, this is Brexit and Britain has been blaming the European Union for the delays in negotiations which to me seems a little like Henry VIII complaining to Anne Boleyn about how she never wears that lovely necklace he bought her anymore

at the wedding of his subsequent wife. And we move on now to round two. I don't know if I officially announced that the previous questions were round one, but you can make up the rules as you go along these days. Let's move on to this question for Team Blame. And, well, here's a very appropriate question, actually, as we're just about to hit the 160 days until Easter mark. Which popular hero died for us so that we may live?

Sorry, not live. I mean, who died for us so that we may get from London to Birmingham 20 minutes quicker? Oh, it's... What was it called? It's a tree that they cut down for HS2. Correct. That's what it was called, a tree.

Yes, a tree. It's a tree. It's a tree. It's a tree. It's a tree. It has a name, Anand. It's not just a piece of wood. It's a sodding tree. Isn't it called the Cuddington Pear? The Cubbington Pear.

The Cubbington Pear. It sounds like a sort of knock-off Paddington Bear, doesn't it? Yes, Paddington Bear said with a cold, Cubbington Pear. Yeah, and it's hundreds of years old and they have cut it down and people were protesting, but they've said it's all right

because they've taken cuttings. So they're going to grow new Cubbington Pears and I hope that the Cubbington Pears will grow strong and wreak vengeance, mighty vengeance. Wasn't it Britain's most favourite... It was Tree of the Year. I must have missed the voting for this.

It was Tree of the Year, Anand, in 2015. That is one of the most prestigious awards, if you're a tree, that you can possibly win. Well, it might get Stool of the Year next year, you never know. Tree of the Year makes you wonder what other awards we're all unaware of, doesn't it? Absolutely. Like Bush of the Month, but don't Google that at work. This is a very moving story, the senseless murder of a 250-year-old pear tree.

Is it rude to say the age of a tree? I don't know. They're so secretive about it. They're like Hollywood stars. You only can really find out the truth after they've died. Cut them open and count to the rings. The Cubbings bear was hacked down to make space for HS2, the celebrity railway line and pre-emptive obsolete relic.

Of course, the Cubbings and Pear is just the latest celebratory to fall victim to the so-called Curse of the Tree of the Year award. The Brimmon Oak, the 2016 British Tree of the Year winner, wound up penniless and eventually succumbed to squirrel addiction, whilst the 1996 winner, the Snutterbridge Ew, was famously found dead in a Las Vegas bathroom with a cocktail of amphetamines and cheap whiskey in its sap stream and a hot young rhododendron naked and comatose in the bath.

Did you honestly just say celebratory? I did say celebratory, yes. Yeah, OK. We all missed that. That deserved a laugh, I thought. I'm sticking with it. Right, so that's two points to Team Blame. Another question now for Team Recrimination.

Who has been swanning off this week? This is America, isn't it? There's a city in Florida called Lake something. What's it called? Lakeland. Lakeland, and they've got too many swans because it seems that what happened is back in 1957, a little lady called the Queen,

it seems that what happened is back in 1957, a little lady called the Queen, she sent a couple of swans. I don't know why I did that. I don't know why I did that. It just came out in the moment. It was so erotic. It was so weird. She was young back then, wasn't she?

A little lady called the Queen. She was a little lady called the Queen. She sent over a couple of swans to Lakeland, primarily because they had a sw lady called the Queen. She sent over a couple of swans to Lakeland, primarily because they had a swan on their flag. It does make you think that if the FBI do want the Queen to send over Prince Andrew for questioning, maybe they should just stick him on a flag for a bit.

But what happened is, over the 63 years that have followed, those two swans have bred and bred and bred from all of their offspring, bred until there's now a bevy of 86 entirely inbred swans, which makes them extra royal. And they are

causing havoc, terrorising ducks and geese and breaking people's arms, although that bit might just be a rumour. And so they've decided to sell them off in pairs. Buy one, get one free on your swans from Lakeland. Roll them, ladies, get your swans. That's what's happening, isn't it, Andy?

That is correct, yeah. Two more points for team recrimination. Sarah, this is really more insult to injury, isn't it, from America to Britain? That's what I was going to say, Andy. It feels like this is exactly how you guys built the empire. Right. The Queen sends in swans, the swans take over. What did they think was going to say, Andy. It feels like this is exactly how you guys built the empire. The queen sends in swans. The swans take over. What did they think was going to happen?

Also, does it not make you think about how do you give swans as a gift? It's impossible to wrap them up. They'll break your arm. People always say that. Do you not feel like people always say that? But have you ever actually met anyone with their arm in a plaster cast? You ask them how it happens and they just go, swan. Well, this is, yeah, the story of Lakeland, Florida,

selling swans at £310 a pair. I mean, typical America, disrespecting our monarch, first declaring independence in 1776 and now this. When will it end? The 36 mute swans are being sold. The swans themselves have had nothing to say on the matter, perhaps understandably.

One more question in this round, again to both teams. What is unlikely to have a late impact on the US election? Oh. This is unlikely to have a late impact on the US election? Oh. This is going to have to be the debates? Not the debate, no. That is unlikely

to have, because no one can possibly change their mind at this. Can you change your mind on Donald Trump now, after five years? I'm not sure that's philosophically possible. Is it this episode of News Quiz? Well... Yeah, I mean, does satire work?

I'm not sure we can impact the US election, but Mock the Week has been on television for, what, over 15 years? And look at Syria. I'm saying Dara O'Brien's got a lot of blood on his hands. Well, no, the answer is an asteroid. There's an asteroid that could hit Earth the day before the election, according to Neil deGrasse Tyson. It's heading this way at 25,000 miles an hour.

But don't get your hopes up, America. It's quite small and it's not going to work. Right, heading into the final round, the scores are 8 to team blame, 10 to team recrimination. And since this is the last show of this year on the News Quiz, I'm now going to ask our panellists to tell me what is going to have happened by the end of the year. And I have with me a crystal ball the prognosticator 3000x

crystal ball that will tell us whether you are right or wrong so who would like to start and tell me what will have happened by the end of this year I got one Andy okay okay headline reads John Lewis Christmas advert to feature slow breathy version of don't stand so close to me OK. Headline reads... That will have happened. I'm getting a positive reading from the machine there. I've got a controversial one, which is... Right. You think that's possible by the end of December? I like to stay optimistic.

How about, fresh from endorsing same-sex civil unions, Pope joins Vatican's only intersectional feminist reading group and sews trans pride flag onto cassock. Well, to be honest, that's a lot more likely than it was 24 hours ago. Chris, any suggestions? What about Joe Biden wins... Oh, we've lost Chris's internet connection. And that is an automatic two-point deduction.

Oh, no! Those are the rules of the series. Finally, some justice. Brutal! I feel genuinely livid. When you said that, I was like, no, I'm on that guy's team, come on! I'm going to give five points to each team, which makes the final scores. Team Blame have 13, and Team Recrimination,

after losing those two points for Chris McCausland's internet, 12. Oh, it's proved crucial. It's proved crucial. It's proved crucial. But don't worry, Sarah. Don't worry, Sarah. Because you're American, we're going to use the US election tribute scoring system and the person with the fewer points wins because they got them in the more

influential rounds. Team Recrimination wins. Thank you very much for listening. Thanks to our wonderful panellists this week, Sarah Barron and Chris McCausland and Anand Menon and Lucy Porter. Do stick around for the archers of this, which finally lives up to its name with a graphically brutal Battle of Agincourt storyline.

the graphically brutal Battle of Agincourt storyline. And don't forget to put your clocks back this weekend to January, ideally. The news quiz will be back in 2021, when hopefully the world will have made its New Year's resolution to be a bit less rubbish than it has been in 2020. I've been Andy Zaltzman. Thank you for listening. Goodbye. Taking part in the news quiz were Sarah Barron, Chris McCausland, Annan Menon and Lucy Porter.

In the chair was Andy Saltzman, and additional material was written by Max Davis, Alice Fraser and Mike Shepard. The producer was Richard Morris, and it was a BBC Studios production. Oh, he's back. Is he back? Hello. Yay! Hello.

There he is. He's back. I have no idea what happened. All I can figure out is that for some reason my computer decided that now would be a good time to do some f***ing updates. Now would be a good time to do some f***ing updates. The stones are thirsty. A village with an impossible secret. The stones are changing people. I look them straight in the eye and I see what's there. Witches.

Bliss. Subscribe to Children of the Stones on BBC Sounds. She's coming. Happy day.