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Podcast Summary: Rachel Johnson's Difficult Women - Episode 192: Marina Wheeler KC
Podcast Overview Title: Rachel Johnson's Difficult Women Description: A podcast featuring women who embrace the label of 'difficult' as a badge of honor, sharing their experiences of overcoming obstacles to achieve their goals. Hosted by Rachel Johnson.
Episode Overview Episode Title: Episode 192: Marina Wheeler KC Description: In this episode, Rachel Johnson interviews Marina Wheeler, a human rights barrister and author, who discusses her new book about resetting UK-EU relations post-Brexit. The conversation delves into personal narratives surrounding Brexit, family dynamics, and the societal implications of the referendum.
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Key Highlights
Introduction of Marina Wheeler
- Former sister-in-law of Rachel Johnson.
- Notable career in human rights law and mediation.
- Recent author of *A More Perfect Union: The Europe We Need*.
Personal Background
- Marina shares her upbringing in Berlin, Brussels, and Washington, D.C.
- Attended Cambridge and completed a master's degree in EU law.
The Book and Brexit
- Book Focus: Advocates for the benefits of Brexit and outlines a path forward for UK-EU relations.
- Main Argument: Although Brexit was contentious, it was a decision made for valid reasons; now the focus should be on how to move forward positively without the EU.
Personal and Political Turmoil
- The impact of Brexit on Marina’s personal life, including her marriage to Boris Johnson and their family dynamics during the divisive political climate.
- Discussion of the Johnson-Wheeler family being thrust into the spotlight during the Brexit referendum.
Key Discussions on Brexit
- Marina describes the narrative that leaving the EU doesn't equate to leaving Europe; the UK can still maintain relationships without EU membership.
- Emphasizes the importance of sovereignty and control over domestic decisions, especially considering historical contexts.
- Critiques the emotional reactions surrounding the Brexit vote, suggesting a need for pragmatic discussions moving forward.
Economic Implications
- Debate on the economic consequences of leaving the EU, with Marina arguing for a focus on sovereignty over economic fears.
- Rachel counters that economic impacts need more attention, referencing Brexit's effect on national wealth and trade.
Immigration and Human Rights
- Marina discusses her views on the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and its relation to immigration policies.
- Contrasts the UK’s approach to immigration with that of other nations like Sweden and Denmark, suggesting that effective policies can be implemented without leaving the ECHR.
Reflections on Family and Identity
- Marina shares insights on her family's mixed feelings about her public writing on Brexit, especially considering the emotional toll it took on their lives.
- Both women reflect on how the public discourse around Brexit affected their family relationships and personal lives.
Concluding Thoughts
- Marina expresses a hopeful perspective on future UK-EU cooperation, emphasizing that friendship and collaboration are still possible despite political separations.
- The episode ends with Marina encouraging readers to engage thoughtfully with the themes in her book.
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Key Takeaways
- Difficult Women: Embracing the label of 'difficult' can lead to significant societal contributions.
- Brexit Narrative: Understanding Brexit requires moving past emotional debates to focus on pragmatic solutions.
- Sovereignty vs. Economics: The balance between national control and economic considerations remains a contentious topic.
- Personal Impact: The intersection of personal life and politics can be challenging, especially during tumultuous times.
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Additional Information
- Follow Rachel Johnson on Twitter: [@RachelSJohnson](https://twitter.com/RachelSJohnson)
- Subscribe: Available on Global Player and other podcast platforms.
This summary encapsulates the engaging and multi-faceted conversation between Rachel Johnson and Marina Wheeler, revealing personal anecdotes intertwined with broader political discussions.
Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.
Transcript
Automatic transcript. May contain errors.0:01Marina Wheeler:This is a Global Player original podcast.
0:11Rachel Johnson:Well behaved women rarely make history. Bloody difficult women do. Marina Wheeler needs no introduction in my household as she's my former sister-in-law. But this Casey and mediator may need introducing to you the former wife of Boris Johnson. She's a distinguished Casey and barrister with a long history and career in human rights, especially. She's now a mediator and she's written a book about why this country was right to leave the EU. Welcome to Difficult Women.
1:04Rachel Johnson:Marina Wheeler, Casey, and I have known each other since we were seven. We went to the same school in Brussels where we were taught in theory to become les bons petits européens, or it should be petite européen. Européen, ladies. Exactly. you were married to my brother for 25 years and we've been friends sisters-in-law aunts in common for as long as I can remember and you're one of the very few women in the world I'm in awe of but other than that there this is a clean sheet and you start a new book yes but but you did say
1:41Marina Wheeler:seven and I just feel I have to point out that you were seven and you were I was a very mature You're eight. So you were just a squit. But I just thought we'd, yeah.
1:51Rachel Johnson:Okay, correct me. Listen, you can correct me on anything. You can correct me on anything. You were born in Berlin, in West Berlin, as it was at the time. Your childhood, like mine, was Brussels and Washington, D.C. We've sort of chased each other around the globe, the Johnson and the Wheeler families. Your children, indeed, are called Johnson-Wheeler.
2:10Marina Wheeler:True.
2:11Rachel Johnson:You went to Cambridge after schooling at Beedells and the European School. And the bit that just I cannot get past is you did a master's degree in EU law in French in Brussels in the 90s. That blew my socks off.
2:29Marina Wheeler:Yes, I can't take it, Marina. The thing is that it's actually not that difficult because you only have the present and the past tense. You don't have when you're doing studying law. You don't have this sort of subjunctive. So there's no talk about feelings or anything complicated. So no conditional tense. So I did struggle with the dictionary. But, you know, once you get those words like. Did you have to do your exams in French? Yes. But that actually was also, again, you're sort of regurgitating stuff. You've already been told. Thanks for the admiration, but it's not completely deserved.
3:10Rachel Johnson:If a Johnson, I think Joe did his exams in French, but you would never hear the end of it. I mean, we would be talking French to each other like we talk in Latin.
3:19Marina Wheeler:Yeah.
3:21Rachel Johnson:um you your son-in-law patrick um is german and you were born in west berlin have you ever been tempted to get a german passport as well because you could i don't think i could
3:36Marina Wheeler:actually but i haven't investigated i know you're giving me a very quizzical look there
3:40Rachel Johnson:you know where this is going a lot of people after the after brexit did go back to their roots and you know friends of ours got a lot of our demographic definitely did yes to to show this
3:54Marina Wheeler:that you know they were still european i don't know rachel if that's why they did it i mean i figured they did it so that they could move more easily around the eu and maybe potentially settle somewhere for more than the stipulated number of days 94 i think it is so i mean i think you know I feel European without a, you know, without a German passport. So I don't know. I mean, that's an interesting one to talk about because I think my position has always been that you can be very pro-European, as I am, without wanting to sort of sign up to this tight union.
4:33Rachel Johnson:We need to explain why we're already talking about our different levels of European-ness. And it's this. It's because you're the author of a book that's coming out in a week called A More Perfect Union. The Europe We Need.
4:49Marina Wheeler:Actually, I'm correcting you again because it came out yesterday. Oh, well, congratulations. Thank you. Congratulations. But this podcast is probably going to be a week after it comes out. So it's already come out then at the time.
5:03Rachel Johnson:Well, when many congratulations on your second or third book. I think there was a legal book, but this is your second kind of general readership book. And it's basically, I mean, if I had to summarise it in six words, and you won't like this. I'm bracing myself already. Why Boris and I were right about Brexit.
5:23Marina Wheeler:I mean, of course I'm not going to like that, am I?
5:26Rachel Johnson:I mean, I wasn't going to do that so quickly.
5:29Marina Wheeler:OK, he, your brother, gets a very brief mention here and there where absolutely necessary. But I don't think my purpose is to align myself with him.
5:42Rachel Johnson:No, true. OK, I'm going to withdraw that actually then. OK. Why the country was right to vote Brexit then?
5:51Marina Wheeler:Can I slightly tweak that? I would say it's more that given that we voted Brexit for not foolish reasons, this is where we need to go next if we do value Europe, as I do. How about that?
6:11Rachel Johnson:Yes.
6:11Marina Wheeler:Don't you think that's a fair sort of encapsulation of the mood of it, which is pretty pro-European?
6:18Rachel Johnson:Yes, and I do remember talking to you at the time and your former husband that there was an insistence which didn't come across enough at the time, which was we weren't leaving Europe, we were leaving the EU, the institutions of the EU. And that got very lost in the toxicity of the debate.
6:40Marina Wheeler:Yes, and still probably is. I mean, given that there's so many things that we are deeply involved with, not least the defense of Europe and, you know, how quickly we came in to defend or help defend Ukraine. But all sorts of other ways, I think. And we have such strong relationships, bilateral relationships as well with so many European countries.
7:05Rachel Johnson:And we have five million European EU citizens here. I mean, exactly. There was a very interesting bit in the book, which, again, I hadn't thought of it either, which was why we didn't need to really be in the institutions in the first place, which was, you know, we'd never been taken over. We'd never been invaded or colonized. We invented democracy and sovereignty and all those concepts ourselves. Therefore, we had no need to kind of insert ourselves into a supranational body that provided all those things for these other countries.
7:43Marina Wheeler:Yeah, I mean, I think it was mostly the fact that we didn't have our institutions smashed up during the Second World War, which almost virtually every other European country did. I mean, either because they were Nazi or they were occupied or, you know, the French Republic sort of fell apart after Vichy. So all of those countries, the Dutch, had such a powerful desire to build something new. Yeah, the French, the Dutch, the Germans. The Italians.
8:14Rachel Johnson:The Italians, the Spanish, well, they had Franco. So all those five main countries in Europe.
8:20Marina Wheeler:Yeah, I mean, if you take the six founders, so you've got the Benelux in there. I mean, that was all occupied, wasn't it? So I think that's a really important reason why we don't have that emotional, the same sort of emotional thing as continental Europeans do. Do you remember what your former mother-in-law used to say, Charlotte? What was that?
8:40Rachel Johnson:Well, no, and she was literally the only family member who actually voted to leave, as well as you and your brother, the former husband. And she would say to me, she understood it on an emotional level. And she said, it's geographical and it's emotional. We are an island nation. We are not part of that continent. Yes, we are. You know, we were a million years ago, probably the part of the pond. We split off and there's a sense of separateness and island nationness that she didn't feel was reflected in our membership of the EU. And she would say that to me.
9:20Marina Wheeler:I don't know if you had that conversation. I didn't have that particular conversation, but I mean, I totally see where she's coming from. And I think the other thing is, you know, the point of the shifting borders, which, you know, is relevant to being an island. because, of course, we didn't have that. But, you know, the countries that we talked about as the centre of the, you know, that founded what became the EU, they all had their borders shifting.
9:45Rachel Johnson:You know, Alsace-Lorraine, all of that, the sort of French. Poland wasn't the founder, but look at Poland. Absolutely.
9:51Marina Wheeler:I mean, it gives a very different complexion to the whole project, I think, on a sort of level that they're just not as sort of pragmatic as we are. You know, we can sort of do a sheet where we have the pros and the cons and think about it and so on. But I think they just see it in a very different way. But I think it helps if we do realize that. But also if they can try and understand why we might not have quite the same approach.
10:19Rachel Johnson:you do spatter that's horrible word actually you pepper you pepper the book with tantalizing biographical and memoirish details about how this seismic event um how you saw it at the time and but things that other journalists and writers have written whole books about you dispose of in a couple of lines. Like, so we voted to leave and then this, you know, and it's extremely, in a way, abstract rather than personal, the book. Do you think so? Yes, very.
10:59Marina Wheeler:Okay, because I think what I've tried to do is weave them together. But I don't, I mean, obviously you can, it's sitting there. I know there's no camera on it, but it's a rather slender book.
11:10Rachel Johnson:I read it in one sitting. Yeah. I mean, and it taught me a lot, Marina, but it didn't teach me a lot about what it was like for you actually at the time apart from the occasional sort of
11:21Marina Wheeler:I think unpleasantness with friends or I think I'm not really I wasn't aiming to write a sort of confessional book I suppose I think I was aiming to just try and write at a time when you know there's less emotion around all of this but I think my feeling is that we do need to get to the nitty-gritty issues but the smattering, peppering, however you want to call it, maybe makes it, I think lightens it a bit but that isn't meant to be the sort of focus of the book. It very much isn't.
11:55Rachel Johnson:It could almost actually be used as a textbook about this was the pragmatic sort of legal sovereignty case for leaving. But that sounds so boring and I hope it isn't that boring. It's genuinely not at all boring.
12:08Marina Wheeler:It's not at all boring as you are not boring. Because some people have even said to me, oh, you've got a few good, you know, wisecracks in there.
Read the full transcript
12:15Rachel Johnson:So did you laugh at any point? Yes, I did laugh. But I mean, I was also, yes, the slug in the ginger beer, but we're not going to talk about that.
12:26Marina Wheeler:At one point, you used this as an example of taught, where I don't even know what taught is.
12:32Rachel Johnson:You've got a really, you know, you've had a varied career as a barrister. you've got this master's degree we've talked about you've specialised in human rights law weirdly because you've been my friend and sister-in-law for so long I've never really asked you about your career Marina so it's really such a good opportunity no let's not but I know you're very distinguished I didn't at one point Keir ask you to be a something czar
13:01Marina Wheeler:well not exactly Though I did do pupillage at the same time as Keir. I mean, that's my kind of... You kept that quiet. I know, I have in fact kept that one quiet. Of partly what the bar was like in the 80s, of being very kind of laddish, because he definitely sort of symbolised that, you know, miners' strike era where Arthur Scargill would sort of come in and out of chambers. And I wasn't part of that inner circle, which is partly why I flounced off to Brussels to do a Masters in EU law. which kind of felt, I mean, oddly, Europe felt much more sort of, well, it felt more cosmopolitan. That and I suppose quite a sort of race, quite a backward bar in those ways.
13:49Rachel Johnson:Why was Scargill coming in and out of your chambers where you and Keir were pupils?
13:53Marina Wheeler:Well, because he, it was what then was called the Labour Law Chambers. So they were advising about Arthur Scargill about trade union law. So it was the sort of height of the miners' strike in the 80s. I know that does sort of age me. You thought this isn't for me? I just felt uncomfortable. I wasn't sure if it was for me, which is why I didn't abandon the law. I just went off and, you know, I mean, you may remember the sort of whole 1992 sort of enthusiasm. So it was quite an exciting time with the EU and European sort of things. But it took me a while to decide that I did want to come to the bar.
14:38Marina Wheeler:And, of course, the bar is completely different now. Not completely different, but a lot better. I mean, a lot more.
14:45Rachel Johnson:So you would have crossed paths with Keir since. I mean, what's your relationship like with him? Is there one? Not really. Does he remember you?
14:57Marina Wheeler:I mean, yes, our paths have crossed a few times since at the bar, but we don't. yeah I mean I wouldn't say I have a you know any relationship of note with yes yes um well I would wait you were going to ask me about my career I know what I wanted to say yeah have it I mean human rights I could talk about how um it's what a terrible idea it is to leave the convention on human rights I do say that in the book um but that may have been sort of missed because that's a whole nother debate um but if you want to talk about my career um i don't mind talking about women at the bar if that's of any interest no maybe not um mediating no i was i was literally
15:43Rachel Johnson:going to get to mediation because i think this is the actual the kernel of why you've written the book yeah because it must be about we had an acrimonious divorce from europe and i'm in you're in a very interesting and sort of expert place to see from both sides as a now professional mediator how we can bring these sides close together.
16:08Marina Wheeler:Yeah, I think there is a mediation sort of impulse there. I'm not sure I was that conscious when I started doing it, but it's definitely there. And I think that now that I've decided to be a full-time mediator rather than a barrister. I think that exercise of putting yourself in different people's shoes, which I try to do in the book, is definitely, yeah, behind quite a lot of it. I mean, only you can say whether you think that it succeeds in that, but that's definitely an aim.
17:01I think that if I had an intellectual query with the book,
17:08Rachel Johnson:it would be that you, I think, do not give enough weight to the economic consequences of leaving the EU. and when you because just when you've got i know rachel reeves is blaming brexit for for the current state of the finances and let's just leave that aside but the governor of the bank of england even donald trump apparently privately said to somebody i know brexit's been a catastrophe i
17:37Marina Wheeler:mean that's kind of okay amusing isn't it to cite donald trump probably the only time you cite him yeah but i'm sure almost everything else that comes out of his mouth i think that is i think
17:48Rachel Johnson:what i would say is that you put disproportionate you give disproportionate importance to the theoretical intangible benefits of leaving the eu i.e sovereignty and control against the the reality of leaving which is real real loss of income and national wealth i mean i don't think
18:12Marina Wheeler:that's, obviously, I don't think that's correct. And I think what I'm doing with talking about sovereignty is trying to explain why, what was happening sort of underneath, why it was necessary to take back control. And I think I try and say that is, the word sovereignty is all sort of abstract, but that's basically about, you know, where decisions are taken and who takes them and what kind of decisions. So I think what I'm trying to do is more sort of get that clear that these are and that those things matter. And then the economic, I think my view is also that, you know, there's so much discussion about it.
18:54And I've tried to distill sort of two sides of that argument.
18:58Marina Wheeler:One of them is that economically, you know, it was quite a neutral, it was quite a neutral thing, because since the 90s, there's not really been a single market. And it's been sort of, you know, overlaid with regulation and stuff. And I think, I don't know if you've read the reports, the letter and the draggy reports that came from the EU, but those are really interesting sort of analyses by the EU itself about its economic problems. And so I'm very much trying to sort of look to the future, except that, you know, of course, there have been economic sort of hits and the friction with sort of, you know, trade and goods and so on, I think is undeniable.
19:41Marina Wheeler:But we have to look to the future and we have to look at where the EU is going, at the fact that the world is different, that the UK is, you know, is changing. And that requires us to do new things in new ways.
19:57Rachel Johnson:Why your book, the book's dedicated to your four children, my beloved nephews and nieces. Why didn't they want you to write there? Well, I think go there again.
20:08Marina Wheeler:Yeah. I mean, I think I can't remember my exact phrase, but I say something about the book that no one wanted, but graciously understood I did. I think they didn't. I think it was just because it was such a fractious time, wasn't it, in 2016? And then onwards. They lived that. And onwards, yeah.
20:27Rachel Johnson:2020, 2021, 22.
20:30Marina Wheeler:Yeah.
20:30Rachel Johnson:It was a torrid time.
20:32Marina Wheeler:Particularly the time around the vote and in the immediate sort of aftermath and before the trade and cooperation agreement. I think when people started to sort of, you know, be more accepting. So I think that period also, you know, the sort of festival of hate had an impact on them, too. So I think there was there's an aversion to sort of that period. But I think they see the value. I mean, I don't want to speak for them. They saw that it was important to me. And I certainly think there is a great importance in going back. You know, it feels like unfinished business in going back and trying to dissect some of it, not because anyone has any great sort of, you know, relish about talking about 2016.
21:17Marina Wheeler:But so we know where to go from now.
21:20Rachel Johnson:There were, I mean, when you talk about the Festival of Hate, I remember visiting you and there being photographers and like little people standing there with waving placards and journalists. And that must have been very difficult as a family. Or did you just kind of think we're just going to get our heads down and get through this?
21:43Marina Wheeler:Well, I think it's most difficult for, you know, youngsters and children because they haven't chosen any of this themselves. And I think even for them, you know, understanding why people felt so strongly about it, that's all very difficult. And I think I was surprised too at quite how strongly people felt about it.
22:05Rachel Johnson:Well, I remember you coming to see me and saying, Rake, why are you talking about the referendum campaign? And why are you writing about it? You've never been interested in this. Well, yes, good point. And stay to your lane.
22:21Marina Wheeler:Not quite what I said. I mean, definitely not what I said. But I do remember getting on my bicycle and cycling over to you in Notting Hill and you sort of setting me down and giving me a cup of tea, looking extremely worried about what was going to happen. But I think the point then was and why. Why did you want to shut me up then? Well, I didn't want to shut you up, but it was after the vote. And this is part of what was extraordinary, was if this had all been a conversation before the vote. Are you sure? Yeah, I am sure. Okay. Yeah, absolutely. Because I remember your brother was at that point.
22:56Rachel Johnson:By the way, everyone, neither of us call him Boris. So that's why you're not going to hear that word. Go on, Marina.
23:01Marina Wheeler:Yeah, so your brother, my ex-husband, was foreign secretary. So it was after the vote. And I think that is the point. And that's what I was quite shocked at, was that there'd been, you know, an agreement between all political parties or the big ones to have this referendum and ask the people of Britain this question. And then the people of Britain gave their answer. But that prompted this sort of, you know, extraordinary campaign to, in a sense, you know, reverse the vote or don't do it. And I think that's the context in which I was saying to you why it was sort of why am I why am I adding pouring fuel onto these flames?
23:40Rachel Johnson:And I think you say democracy depends on losers consent. Yeah. And that maybe that was your point. That's not quite how I remember it, but I accept that was was what was going on. So there was the vote was on the 23rd of June 2016. the whole country sort of went up in flames essentially and then carried on burning for years.
24:02Marina Wheeler:If you like, to put it that way. No, what I'm thinking about in terms of division and dispute.
24:10Rachel Johnson:The fact that people just couldn't, I mean, families broke up, parties broke up, the country seemed to break up. It's all much, much calmer now. And I think this is why your book is very timely and very welcome too. there was the whole drama over the leadership after Cameron resigned the day after the referendum and didn't go the government's way and we all know that we don't need to go back over that but you do tell us that Dominic Cummings came to see you at home in tears when Michael Gove said that he could not support my brother your former husband's leadership campaign yeah why do you
24:49Marina Wheeler:think he came what was it like well we had been at the you know intended launch and then the intended launch was not a launch at all it was a sort of um I'm not going to stand and then I don't remember where my ex-husband went but I went home um which is quite near to to where Dominic Cummings lived or he still lives there and I don't I don't really know why he turned up whether I mean I'm I'm sure he didn't think it was going to be you.
25:17Rachel Johnson:He didn't come for me. Yeah.
25:19Marina Wheeler:Oh, that slightly ruins the story.
25:21Rachel Johnson:I wanted it to be about you and him. Go on. So he rings the bell, bicycle helmet, you know, he's got his Brompton bike or whatever.
25:33Marina Wheeler:I think maybe he also just wanted then to know from me what had happened. But as I say in the book, I sort of strongly suspected that he knew more than I did. And I was pretty sort of, you know, guarded. So I don't know. And still to this day, and I haven't really, I decided I'm not going to spend my life trying to find out what these things were all about.
25:54Rachel Johnson:But does this suggest that Dominic Cummings didn't know
26:00Marina Wheeler:that his intention was to stand aside?
26:03Rachel Johnson:I have no idea. It just goes to show that nobody really knows anything.
26:07Marina Wheeler:Well, either, yeah, they don't know anything or they pretend to not know anything or they... Or it was a clever traitor style double bluff.
26:15Rachel Johnson:He had to come to your house in order for you to think he didn't know. It's just also... Who knows, maybe. Interestingly, Marina, I still think that we could have fixed a lot of the problems from within if there'd been better leadership, better relations with our European partners. because since the Brexit vote, I've spoken to so many farmers who tell me how ridiculous it was, the common agricultural policy, how they were made. For example, I was in Transylvania the other day, and they said it was just ridiculous. We were told when to cut our wheat, and they said we couldn't cut our wheat using tractors.
27:03Rachel Johnson:We had to scythe it because tractors were bad for the environment. Do they have any idea how many hectares of wheat we have to... You know what I mean? And I completely understood the point of subsidiarity when it comes to industries and farming and things like that. But I still think there could have been a renegotiation.
27:22Marina Wheeler:Rake, that's such an interesting point that you sort of alight on about common agricultural policy because you'll remember when we were kids in the 70s. The wine lakes. Yeah, I mean, this outrage about the common agricultural policy was happening right then from the beginning. You know, my father was a journalist when Stanley was in the commission.
27:42Rachel Johnson:Charles Wheeler.
27:43Marina Wheeler:Yeah, so he used to report about that. And things got better over time. I mean, you know, Thatcher used to have to swing her bag around a lot to get reform of the CAP, and she did to an extent. And the other thing about the CAP was that it meant that Britain's contribution was unnaturally high because it was fixed in the CAP. Anyway, the point is that the fact that this continued after all this decade of effort, I think is an indication that it is very hard to change the fundamentals of the EU and that much as I would have loved that reform renegotiation to have succeeded, it wasn't going to. And so I think that where we ought to be is that we ought to recognize that we're still friends and allies, but you don't have to be part of a very rigid set of sort of governance to be able to work together.
28:40Marina Wheeler:So it's about just being respectful of different ways of doing things. And I'm completely convinced that there are so many ways we could cooperate with other European countries. Very fruitfully in, you know, economic things, security, education, cultural, all of that stuff without being in the EU. And still be able to sort of feel we're European and feel, you know, happy about that.
29:10Rachel Johnson:and can you explain your position on the echr which you've alluded to already it's it's misunderstood everything about most of these courts and institutions is misunderstood and the echr isn't an eu institution yeah many right-wing lawyers think that we need to leave and that is the position of the tory party and reform to leave the echr in order to regain
29:33Marina Wheeler:control of the border what's your position i mean it's a complicated one and i could bore on for ages but trying to distill it i mean it's different to the eu because that court has nowhere near the same sort of power as the ecj used to have it doesn't automatically change the law and so on so that's a really important difference and there are relatively speaking few decisions that that really go to the core of what we do migration is something that is you know that's the focus that's the reason why the Conservative Party now says they want to leave. But my position is that there are so many things that you can do at a national level using domestic law if you want to toughen up on migration.
30:20Marina Wheeler:And you don't need to leave the ECHR to do that. And the ECHR is so much more as well than migration. But I think that the best example, and maybe sort of evidence that I'm right about that, is that the Dutch and the Swedes have both, are both now operating really quite tough migration policies. They have dramatically reduced the numbers coming in, including asylum seekers. And they've done that without leaving the ECHR. So I think it would be quite useful to, you know, focus on that.
30:56Rachel Johnson:And just on the ECJ, which you've mentioned, And leaving the EU meant that European law did not supersede UK sovereign law. And that was a very important feature of Brexit for you.
31:11Marina Wheeler:Yes, yes.
31:12Rachel Johnson:And why that matters is that is about who is taking the decision ultimately.
31:18Marina Wheeler:and yeah I think that I mean my view is just that democracy suffers if you have important decisions being taken too far away from the people that they affect.
31:32Rachel Johnson:Yes I mean you make that very you put it very clearly in the book you know take decisions at the level at which they will take effect.
31:39Marina Wheeler:Yeah so you only take decisions at EU level if it's really necessary and you can do better at EU level.
31:44Rachel Johnson:But telling a farmer in Transylvania when to harvest his wheat, I mean, is completely insane really, when the farmer has been there for 500 years, since medieval times doing it when it's the right time.
31:56Marina Wheeler:Well, do you remember in Brussels as well, all those times when farmers would come and sort of dump manure on the Brunei-Lawar? Outside the Brunei-Lawar. Exactly. I mean, I think, but if only the EU had taken that sort of principle to heart way back, you know, the day we wouldn't be sitting here having this exact conversation
32:34Rachel Johnson:your dad i don't know whether he would have approved brexit or not what do you think It's a funny one.
32:41Marina Wheeler:I mean, my sister and I, who don't agree on this subject, we've never gone there because I think we both know that would be too much. I mean, I think he wouldn't like, I have thought about this. This is Charles Wheeler, Sir Charles Wheeler, one of, if not the most distinguished BBC broadcaster and foreign correspondent this country has seen in modern times. Well, that's very nice. Well, obviously, I'm not going to contradict you on that. But I think that he would have not liked the sort of, the kind of sniff of, how do I put this, the sort of, the kind of sniff of being anti -foreigner that was around at the time of the referendum.
33:29Marina Wheeler:He wouldn't have liked that. But I think he would have respected the position of, you know, if you are running a democracy, it matters who takes decisions and, you know, that people need to be involved in that and understand that. And also that, you know, you have to a project is not a good one if it only works for a minority of people.
33:54Rachel Johnson:It needs to work for everyone.
33:56Marina Wheeler:so I don't know what he would have thought I mean in the book I try and address this point about how I think you know it was Romaine and also Farage that tried to sort of taint the discussion with the whole immigration issue but maybe that's
34:13Rachel Johnson:they achieved their objective weaponising the immigration issue but now they're re-weaponising it because thanks to their campaign Who do you mean by they? Well, I'm talking about the sort of so-called Brexit Party nationalist types who said, you know, you've got to have 80 million Turks on your doorstep or whatever.
34:36Marina Wheeler:But hang on a moment, because, I mean, I also do go to pains to say that Vote Leave was very different to Farage's group. And it's Farage now who is making such a big thing about migration.
34:50Rachel Johnson:But now the conversation has again turned on its head. And a former, I can't even say, a former member of David Cameron's cabinet said to me only this week that the great unspoken lie or unspoken, you can't say this out loud, is that leaving the EU meant that we exchanged, you know, white educated, hardworking polls, for example, with uneducated, undocumented. People from countries where they don't treat women very well.
35:25Marina Wheeler:Okay.
35:26Rachel Johnson:That is now the conversation that has been created by the fact that we've seen a huge bump in net migration. And we've seen a net deficit of EU migration into the UK. Do you see? We've got a million others and we've got minus when it comes to Europeans.
35:46Marina Wheeler:Well, it is interesting because, you know, You said that's something that someone in David Cameron's cabinet said, but that can't be spoken. I mean, if that was actually part of the conversation, then one could unpick it because it's quite an extraordinary thing to say. And I think it's.
36:04Rachel Johnson:But it's true. Can facts be racist if you look at where the migration is coming from? Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen. Do you know what I mean? And then when you see where it used to come from, it has there has been a switch.
36:17Marina Wheeler:There has been a switch. But for all sorts of reasons. I mean, do you actually want to, do you want to dissect this? No, but what would you say about it? Well, I'd say it's an incredibly complicated issue, immigration. You know, how much we need, whether it's migration, whether it's asylum, how much we need from where, low skilled or high skilled. I think it is. I think the benefit, if one is going sort of, you know, taking it back to our discussion about leaving the EU, I think the benefit is that we can have this conversation, not a kind of, you know, behind the scenes whispering. Well, that's what, you know.
36:57Rachel Johnson:No, what I'm saying, people are increasingly saying that sort of thing out loud, whereas, you know, in the previous to that, that sounds like Enoch Powell, you know.
37:06Marina Wheeler:Now we can discuss it and we can choose. And that is a, you know, that is an advance. but I mean I think there's all sorts of sort of misconceptions and weaponizing that goes on so I can't say I'm happy about the conversation now that we're having about migration but we obviously need to have it and that was also a you know that was a that was a problem. But you've
37:30Rachel Johnson:sort of talked you've you've said you've talked to me as if what I've said is is racist but you've also quoted approvingly the fact that Sweden has really managed to exclude mass immigration from exactly those countries. But no, I'm trying to say that I'm, and I think I say quite clearly in the
37:48Marina Wheeler:book that I'm trying to be neutral about the substance of the choice. What matters, because it's a democratic choice, and you know, different people will have different views about it. But But what matters is that you are able to choose and that you as a nation can look at the pros and cons. And I don't think Britain is exactly the same as Denmark or Sweden. And I'm definitely not speaking approvingly. And I'm sorry if I gave that impression about them cutting migration dramatically. I'm speaking approvingly in the sense that they didn't need to leave the EU in order to sort of advance. It was a policy they had decided as a nation they wanted to do.
38:34Marina Wheeler:So I think it's that bit, you know, leave aside, we, you know, it's their choice. But they had chosen. And I guess that Metta Fredrickson was voted in on a platform of reducing migration dramatically. And then my point about that was just that she could do that without needing to leave the ECH. Got it.
38:55Rachel Johnson:we were running short of time which is very sad as I don't get to sit with you one on one very often we're usually in a kind of mass gathering or a clan gathering with sort of hundreds of people and we've got to do the difficult times bit oh yes but it just you know I just want to say one last thing about that whole time which is it was weirdly good for my marriage I mean because my husband and I were so remain it brought us close together and I remember him tweeting something like Rachel and I have never agreed about anything apart from Brexit and it it was you know you I know that you talked to my brother and former husband because I saw you at it you know about the substance of the book and I don't know whether it's been helpful a helpful exercise is what I'm asking in terms of just the kind of the legacy of of your 25 year marriage can you now sort of sit down and have a kind of chirpy conversation about brexit with him that's a very interesting question i mean do blended families conversation is yeah do blended families depend on losers consent or whatever ask me about the most difficult time all right then when i've been difficult when
40:22Marina Wheeler:you've been difficult but it was nice to see it was honestly i love i love it it's like when i
40:28Rachel Johnson:used to see my mother and father together it used to make me feel happy kind of in a deep kind of deep you know in a way i liked you know i think children do mind yeah and i sort of like seeing you chatting to him as well because it makes me feel all right how do you know it was chirpy though
40:43Marina Wheeler:I mean, because I didn't punch him. No plates were thrown.
40:51Marina Wheeler:Okay. Oh, wait. I do want to say a thing about being... Difficult. Yeah, because when you said... I think this is quite a good one. About family gatherings and events. So can I say this one? The sausages.
41:06Rachel Johnson:No, no, not the sausages. Oh, all right. What? Okay, so this... I think it comes into the category of being difficult.
41:17Marina Wheeler:But remonstrating with you, I don't know if you remember this. Remonstrating with you, so we used to have, you know, these big family gatherings.
41:26Rachel Johnson:Marina used to host about 25 people for Christmas, you know, and you still do.
41:32Marina Wheeler:So, well, okay, so, well, that's very nice of you. But you would then arrive and tell me I'd cooked everything wrong.
41:40Rachel Johnson:And I was right.
41:41Marina Wheeler:Yeah. I wasn't an enthusiastic cook, which is why I got my... Do you remember when we did two turkeys at Cheeville? That actually was. Those were both good turkeys, weren't they? Anyway, what were you going to say? Anyway, so this was after family gatherings, whatever, Christmas, Easter, birthdays. A couple of days afterwards, I would read in, whether it was the mail on Sunday or some kind of account of these episodes. So do you remember I would ring up, I'd ring you up and I'd kind of remonstrate with you and be a bit pompous about privacy and stuff and you'd be really remorseful and say, oh, I'm so sorry, I'm really, you know, it will never happen again, you'd say, and then I'd receive a beautiful rose bush from you.
42:31Marina Wheeler:But the fact that I've actually got a rose garden now from all of the times that you sent me the rose bush, you're looking outraged, suggests that it happened more than once.
42:42Rachel Johnson:But you know what, Marina? I mean, this is no excuse at all. But I was writing a column for the Mail on Sunday and my brother was Prime Minister or Foreign Secretary or leading the Leave campaign. And every week my editor would say, can you write about that? And I'd say no. And he'd say, well, then you're fired.
43:00Marina Wheeler:I swear to God. Anyway, I am not complaining.
43:04Rachel Johnson:And I hated doing it. Since I have such lovely roses. I have every cell of my body. I hated doing it. I literally was under orders.
43:15Rachel Johnson:But you being difficult is ticking me off after I've done my job, which I understand.
43:20Marina Wheeler:So that wasn't even being that difficult. It was just mildly bullshit.
43:24Rachel Johnson:But what has been your most difficult time? I know that you lost your lovely mother Deep who was the most extraordinary person and you
43:34Marina Wheeler:as was your lovely mother I know, we'll cry if we go there
43:37Rachel Johnson:and you've been open about having, you know had cancer and got through it and it's kind of completely passed but I would imagine the week the divorce came through Deep was not well and you've been she died and the cancer must have not been the greatest of times.
43:57Marina Wheeler:That wasn't the greatest of times. That is very well put. But I think probably the worst. I mean, in a way, that was so bad that, you know what it's like, you're kind of slightly floating above. It's sort of like, oh, yeah, and that and this. But I think actually you mentioned the cancer probably, and I have written about, I did write about this at the time, because I was trying to encourage people to have screening, cervical cancer screening, what's it called? Smear test. Was having my, so I had to have some surgery to deal with this. It was early stage. I had some surgery and I was lying in the recovery room after the surgery, kind of coming around slowly.
44:42Marina Wheeler:And it became obvious to me that I couldn't really see very well. And my Macmillan nurse sort of walked past and didn't recognize me. and then another nurse came up and said, did you look like that when you came in? And it became clear that actually my face had puffed up like a balloon and it was something to do with having keyhole surgery and gasping sort of captured under your skin. You never saw me looking like this. Anyway, the worry was I was never going to recover from this terrible disfigurement. But so as I lay there all day and then when the evening came, I was meant to go for a bed. I was sort of wheeled off into another holding ward to wait for the bed.
45:28Marina Wheeler:And I thought, no one will remember I'm here and my face is all. So that was probably the rock bottom time. But I guess being difficult, I stormed out of the ward and then I got a bed.
45:42Rachel Johnson:Did you? I did. I pulled off my, you know, heart monitor and just thought, I can't stand this.
45:49Marina Wheeler:And the children came to see you. The children came to see me. I remember Cassie describing you with such kindness. But also they were very funny. They said, you know. I hope no photographs were taken. Yeah, they were. One of them showed them to me, but they haven't seen the light of day. I mean, it was like, you know, bubble wrap kind of thing that you could pop it like that. What, all over your body or just on your face?
46:10Rachel Johnson:No, my face and then my neck.
46:12Marina Wheeler:so they said you've always loved bubble wrap
46:14Rachel Johnson:you can just pop your neck well as one of the interviews with you I think it was in the Telegraph said you're beautiful and beautifully dressed and so luckily the effects of that were not lasting and you were looking very well and you've got this brilliant book out and you've become a mediator and it's just been an absolute joy to have you here as my guest, thank you Marina Wheeler for being this week's Difficult Woman. Thank you, Rachel.
46:54Rachel Johnson:Well, that was lovely for me. I hope it wasn't for you too much like sitting around the Johnson Wheeler Sunday lunch table. Anyway, I thoroughly enjoyed it and I recommend the book. Thank you for listening to another episode of my difficult women podcast just remember to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts to make sure the latest episode is ready to go every friday afternoon bye
From the publisher
This week’s Difficult Woman is the human rights barrister, author, and Rachel’s former sister-in-law, the very redoubtable Marina Wheeler KC, who has written an acute new book about how the UK should reset relations with the EU after Brexit.
In a highly personal and at times confrontational conversation, the pair revisit this most painful and divisive period in British political history: the narrowly fought EU referendum and its bitter aftermath, an unprecedentedly turbulent period which saw the Johnson-Wheeler family thrust centre stage, Marina’s marriage to Boris Johnson break down, and her former husband achieve his lifetime’s ambition of becoming PM.
And that’s just the bare bones of it!