Rob Bailey sits down with Ashford MP Damian Green, with questions on the Eurostar, the future of local journalism and the General Election.
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00:00 (upbeat music)
00:02 - Welcome to this special edition
00:20 of the Kent Politics Show,
00:21 in which we're talking to some of the most influential
00:24 and powerful politicians in Kent.
00:25 And today it's Damien Green,
00:27 the Conservative MP for Ashford.
00:29 Welcome Damien. - Hello.
00:30 - Hi.
00:32 I wanted to start by having a chat with you about Eurostar.
00:36 Obviously very recently, one of the heads of Eurostar
00:38 was at Ashford Council giving an update,
00:40 the news there that there'll be no return
00:42 of international services before 2025.
00:46 On the 10th anniversary of Eurostar,
00:47 you said that there'd be no greater benefit
00:49 to Ashford's economy than the domestic
00:51 and international services that that's brought to the area.
00:53 How much of a blow is it that those won't be returning?
00:56 - I mean, it is a blow.
00:57 It's not news in that they've been saying that
01:00 ever since we came out of the pandemic
01:04 and everyone who was at that meeting
01:07 and who's been involved as I have for many years,
01:11 in the last few years, trying to get Eurostar services back
01:13 reflected that the tone was very slightly more positive
01:17 than we'd heard from them before.
01:19 I think straight after the pandemic,
01:22 there's no doubt that Eurostar were thinking,
01:24 let's just announce Kent services are never coming back.
01:28 And there was a series of meetings with me
01:29 and Kent County Council and Ashford Borough Council,
01:31 and we persuaded them not to do that
01:33 and to leave the option on the table,
01:35 which is where we still are,
01:37 with slightly warmer noises than we'd had before.
01:40 So we will be continuing the campaign.
01:43 There's a petition out,
01:45 which I'm glad to see has been supported
01:47 by more than 30,000 people,
01:48 and we're trying to get those numbers up,
01:50 because they're all potential passengers.
01:52 So in the end, if we can convince Eurostar
01:55 that it will be commercially viable
01:57 to start running services from Ashford again,
01:59 then the world would be a happier place.
02:01 - They say these things, they couch them in certain terms,
02:03 and not before 2025, which of course could mean anything.
02:06 Do you think 2025, there might be a realistic date
02:09 for when we might see services return?
02:11 - Yes, I do.
02:12 And I think I'd obviously like them back sooner than that,
02:16 'cause it'd be good to get them back sometime next year.
02:19 But the truth is, next year, the Olympics are in Paris,
02:23 and one of the points Eurostar make
02:26 is that they are still not sure
02:28 how getting people on board is gonna operate
02:30 under the new post-Brexit system
02:33 that we'll have to go through,
02:34 of the European entry and exit system,
02:36 which they're introducing around the EU.
02:38 So I would imagine by next autumn, it will be introduced,
02:42 give it a few weeks to settle down,
02:44 and at that point, we're in what will hopefully
02:46 be a new normal, where they'll know how to operate
02:49 international train services with this new system.
02:51 - It's that Olympic date is what I had in mind
02:53 when I was thinking of 2025,
02:55 because there'll be a lot of people here in Kent
02:57 who would have been thinking,
02:58 what a great opportunity to go and enjoy Olympics,
03:00 as we did here in London in 2012, of course.
03:02 And a lot of businesses that would have seen opportunities
03:06 with a very high-speed link down to Paris
03:08 to potentially kind of benefit from the economic
03:11 kind of benefits of an Olympic Games.
03:13 It's gonna be hard for Kent businesses to do that
03:15 without a direct link, isn't it?
03:16 - Yeah, absolutely.
03:17 I mean, of course, I'd love them to announce today
03:19 that they're bringing them back tomorrow,
03:21 but I'm being realistic about it.
03:23 I think they probably won't,
03:24 'cause what they won't want to do
03:26 is start them again and stop them again.
03:29 Various of us have asked, can you maybe just restore
03:32 the Olympic period or something like that?
03:34 And for various practical reasons,
03:36 they're not gonna do that.
03:38 So as I say, I think we're probably looking
03:40 the other side of the Olympics
03:41 before we can hope to get services back again.
03:43 - Sticking with transport,
03:44 the other major transport link that Ashford benefits from,
03:48 I suppose we should say, is the M20.
03:50 But as you said, just like the rail,
03:52 which has been affected ever since Brexit,
03:55 since we've left the European Union,
03:57 the M20 has very rarely functioned properly.
04:01 I'm sure you're aware, travelling particularly
04:03 kind of towards the east of the county,
04:05 contraflows, lower speed limits
04:08 has really become the typical experience.
04:11 Is that a frustration for you?
04:12 And do you think the M20 is still fit for purpose?
04:15 - The M20 is fit for purpose when it's open.
04:18 Indeed, it's a huge asset, as you say.
04:19 And yes, it's been hugely frustrating.
04:21 It's the combination of Operation Brock being on and off
04:25 and the road works.
04:26 I think there's, at the long term,
04:27 the thing I'm most trying to achieve,
04:30 and I'm sort of halfway there, I think,
04:32 is to persuade transport ministers
04:34 that the whole issue of Dover and the tunnel
04:37 and blockages and being too busy and not being able to cope
04:41 is a national problem and not just a Kent problem.
04:43 - We've mentioned collectively Brexit
04:44 quite a few times in all of this.
04:46 Obviously, that's becoming a bit of a political issue again.
04:49 Now, some talk about whether or not
04:50 a closer working relationship,
04:52 slightly different working relationship with the EU
04:55 might be a slightly smoother way of doing things,
04:57 particularly the Labour Party
04:58 have been talking about that recently.
05:00 Do you think that from a Kent point of view,
05:03 we do need to revisit some of these things
05:04 because it would iron out some of the issues
05:06 around the trains, around the roads, around Dover?
05:09 - Well, I think, I mean, it depends on what you mean
05:11 by revisit.
05:12 I mean, the thought of going through that debate again
05:15 fills me with horror.
05:16 And I was, I campaigned for Remain,
05:18 but I was never in favour of a second referendum
05:21 because I thought that would just divide the country further.
05:24 So, can we continue to tweak the current model?
05:28 Yes, of course we can, and we'll need to.
05:30 I mean, things will change.
05:31 And I think one can see that at times
05:34 when we have decent relations at the top of government,
05:38 it goes well.
05:39 And there has been a sort of palpable practical change
05:42 in the French attitude to Britain
05:44 over the past 12 months or so.
05:46 And in Kent, we benefit from that.
05:48 - I want to ask you, you're a former journalist,
05:50 you're a member of the DCMS committee.
05:52 I want to ask you a little bit
05:54 about what's happening in regional news,
05:56 which I know is a big concern
05:57 the Department for Culture, Media and Sport at the moment.
06:01 Meta has just pulled out of community news funding.
06:04 We know that regional news in this country
06:07 is in something of a crisis of funding at the moment.
06:10 Do you think that there is a role for government
06:13 in stepping in and helping to plug
06:15 some of these financial gaps?
06:16 And if not, how do we make sure
06:19 that regional news remains viable?
06:21 - I mean, I think I'm slightly wary in principle
06:25 at the thought of government-funded journalists
06:27 for all the obvious reasons.
06:28 You know, if in the end the government is paying your salary
06:31 then in the end the government can tell you what to do.
06:34 But yes, of course there is a funding crisis
06:39 and it particularly affects print.
06:42 And the real problem is that the various regional groups
06:47 or individual newspapers as we traditionally regard them
06:51 find it very difficult to generate as much money
06:54 out of a digital customer as they used to
06:57 out of somebody who bought the paper every day or every week.
07:02 And that is the conundrum for them.
07:04 And it's a business conundrum.
07:06 As long as we want and we do to have independent news outlets
07:11 and competing news outlets so you can get a range of views.
07:15 It's even more difficult at a local level.
07:18 And it's a great shame Meta's pulled out.
07:20 Google still provides money for a fund
07:23 and indeed the BBC provides money for a fund.
07:25 So there are ways of doing it.
07:27 So I think not directly from government.
07:29 - It's an interesting one, is it?
07:30 Because I mean, obviously anyone who talks to journalists
07:32 about this will hear your opinion
07:34 about the government's involvement in news being echoed
07:36 that there is a worry about state control.
07:38 But of course there is always a compromise involved
07:40 with philanthropy from large organisations like Meta
07:43 who need to be scrutinised but also then are putting money in.
07:46 - Fair point.
07:47 - It becomes a kind of intractable problem
07:49 if who is the right person to fund news, if you will.
07:52 - Well, and the other thing, I mean,
07:53 it's a question for society that if we collectively
07:56 are not prepared to pay what is a fairly small amount
07:59 of money to have independent news, then we won't get it.
08:03 - We're talking now on one of the local TV franchises
08:05 that has been a real success over the last 10 years
08:08 or so around the country.
08:09 Those are coming up for consultation again.
08:12 The future of local TV up to about 2035
08:16 is currently being debated.
08:18 Should the government guarantee local TV's existence
08:21 in the future?
08:23 - That would be very good.
08:24 And obviously we've got a media bill coming before parliament
08:27 in the near future.
08:29 So I think when we get round this round of regulatory change
08:34 to have local TV embedded as part of the system
08:38 would be very good for the whole ecology
08:41 of broadcasting in this country,
08:43 because in a sense, the old distinctions between online
08:48 and broadcasting and print are just dissolving, aren't they?
08:52 That every piece of product, of content is available
08:59 on every medium now.
09:01 So in preserving local TV,
09:04 you're actually also preserving local news more generally.
09:06 And that's what we need to do.
09:08 - Looking ahead to the next general election,
09:10 you put a bid forward to become the MP
09:13 for the New Weald constituency that's being created,
09:16 obviously as part of the boundary changes
09:18 that are happening here in Kent.
09:19 They eventually went to Katie Lamb.
09:21 She's something of that kind of more right wing area
09:24 of the party, an advisor to Suella Braverman.
09:25 She was an advisor to Boris Johnson before.
09:28 Do you think that reflects a change in the culture
09:30 that that's the kind of conservative
09:32 that is perceived to be a winner these days?
09:35 - No, I think, I mean, individual,
09:37 I mean, Katie's clearly hugely talented
09:39 and will have a great career, I'm absolutely sure.
09:42 And I'll be fighting the Ashford half of the seat
09:45 at the next election.
09:46 But I think if you look around the country
09:49 at all the selections, there will be a range of views.
09:52 It's the point I make about being a broad church.
09:56 It's actually overdone the thought
09:58 of how much ideology contributes to an individual selection.
10:02 It doesn't much, people are looking for other things
10:07 when in particular when they're selecting a new candidate.
10:10 - Why was the Weald seat your first choice out of the two?
10:15 - Well, it's where I live.
10:17 So, you know, literally my seat is more or less cut in half.
10:20 So it was one or the other and I chose the one where I live,
10:22 but you know, they didn't want me, but the Ashford side do.
10:26 So everyone is happy.
10:29 - And just looking ahead to that general election,
10:30 everyone expects it to come probably sometime next year,
10:33 possibly in the autumn.
10:34 Can the Conservatives win it?
10:36 - Yeah, I mean, just over a year ago,
10:41 as we're sitting here today,
10:42 we had the Liz Trust budget, which convulsed politics.
10:46 But if therefore about a year and a week ago,
10:51 I told you, I'm going to predict that Rishi Sunak
10:53 will be prime minister in September, October, 2023,
10:58 you'd have thought you're mad.
11:00 What are you talking about?
11:02 You've just had an election that he's lost.
11:04 And the year before that, Boris Johnson,
11:07 people were writing articles, learning articles,
11:10 suggesting he's got Brexit done
11:13 and he's COP26 has gone well.
11:16 And therefore, you know,
11:18 he's likely to be in power for the next 10 years.
11:20 So I'm just drawing the conclusion that asking me
11:23 what's going to happen a year ahead in politics
11:26 is always a mugs game.
11:27 So I think those who think they're absolutely certain
11:29 what will happen in the external election
11:31 are almost certainly wrong.
11:33 - It's a wait and see kind of situation.
11:35 Damien Green, MP for Ashford,
11:37 thank you so much for joining us.
11:38 - Thank you.
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