Starmer takes responsibility for Mandelson – but did he lie to Parliament?

0:03Camilla: The Telegraph.

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1:02Tim: Kirstama has accepted full responsibility for the Mandelson scandal. It's me who made the mistake, he says. It's me who apologises to Epstein's victims.

1:11Camilla: But did the Prime Minister mislead the House of Commons and lie to Parliament? And is the government guilty of breaking the ministerial code with that£75 ,000 payoff? And the government's anti-Muslim definition. Is it going to suppress free speech and lead to figures like me and Tim being accused of Islamophobia?

1:33Tim: We spoke to the man who wrote the definition, Dominic Grieve, and asked, why do we need this at all when it's already illegal? And is this the right time to do it when anti-Semitism is on the rise?

1:44Camilla: Welcome to The Daily Tea with me, Camilla Tominy.

1:46Tim: And me, Tim Stanley.

1:58Camilla: Tim, it's the morning after the release of the Mandy Files. We did cover their contents extensively yesterday as we got out our highlighters and our folders. But this isn't going away for the Prime Minister, is it?

2:11Tim: No, it's not, because it's a question about his judgement and whether or not he's been entirely open with us about how Mandy was appointed.

2:20Camilla: So as we detailed yesterday, there are three killer pages in these files which amount to 147 pages altogether, which lay bare all of Mandelson's quite dodgy associations. And we discussed yesterday, before you even get to Epstein, you've got to get through his chairmanship of Global Council, which had links to China, Russia, Qatar and others.

2:45Tim: His links to the Hinduja brothers and his loan from Geoffrey Robertson, over both of which he had to resign when he was previously in government.

2:52Camilla: We also have an extensive briefing note informing him of evidence suggesting that Mandelson's relationship to Epstein was very close, including a January 2024 piece I contributed to for The Telegraph, along with two colleagues, laying bare in over a thousand words just how chummy they were.

3:16Tim: So that's what's in the documents. What we're now trying to do is piece together what's not in them. and find out what was going on behind the scenes. Well, one more detail from that release was Jonathan Powell was quoted in an internal memo about discussions that followed the sacking of Mandy, saying that he thought the process at the time had been, quote, weirdly rushed. And according to the Times, Powell was even stronger in private. Quote, his view was that Peter is always a disaster and we always end up having to fire him, said a senior official.

3:50Camilla: So that's Jonathan Powell acting as Keir Starmer's national security advisor, just to remind everyone back in the day he was Blair's chief of staff. So he was at the heart of the new Labour project. You might imagine that there could be loyalty to Mandelson because they were both in the same camp, but clearly not. The impression once given of Powell is that he really did know where the bodies were buried and he did try and flag how dangerous this appointment was. which then leads us on to Starmer's subsequent chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney, and this notion that actually quite a lot of responsibility was devolved to him in the appointment of Mandelson.

4:35Camilla: Now, that's significant because we are trying to interrogate how much the prime minister did or didn't know. And it seems very obvious to us now we've read the documents that he was presented with that he must have known a great deal. But ever the technocrat, Starmer's approach has not only to blame the staff, because of course McSweeney's now fallen on his sword, he's gone, but it's also to repeatedly insist, Tim, that due process was followed at all times. We'll drill into that in just a moment, but you observed something about an empty box in the paperwork, Tim.

5:13Tim: Oh, I'm not the only person who's observed that. I don't want to take credit for all of that, But it is true that there is in these documents an empty box where normally the Prime Minister would write what his response is and what he wants to see done next. And the curious thing is that this box is empty. Now, the explanation given by officials inside Number 10 is there are other means for the Prime Minister to communicate his instructions. But obviously, if we're going for full transparency here, we need to know what those are, where those are. Are we talking a phone call? Are we talking WhatsApp?

5:49Tim: Why are they not part of this document if they were written down? We are also told that the Prime Minister instructed Morgan McSweeney to go and put questions to Peter Mandelson. And the McSweeney then returned with those answers. So that conveniently puts a bit of distance between the Prime Minister and Mandelson. We're not talking about the Prime Minister ringing up Mandy and saying, what's this about your relationship with Epstein? This is farmed out to someone else who then passed it on.

6:20Camilla: But it's the wrong person to farm it out to if that person...

6:24Tim: It's the person advocating most strongly for that person to get the job.

6:28Camilla: And is Mandelson's protege. So he has got a very close personal relationship with Mandelson, Yet he's the person, the so-called objective observer, who is advising the PM on this appointment.

6:42Tim: This is like asking Robin to put some difficult questions to Batman.

6:46Camilla: Yes. Right. Exactly. Others did also express reservations, Tim. So we have Sir Philip Barton, who is the former permanent secretary at the Foreign Office. He raised reservations about the appointment. He was said to have been partly influenced by Dame Karen Pierce. who was the outgoing ambassador to the US, who, quote, repeatedly flagged the Epstein risk. Now, we're going to come on to the question of whether the prime minister has actually lied to the House of Commons, as Kemi Bainok is now claiming in just a moment. But there is a potential legal issue on the horizon, and that concerns the£75 ,000, well, can we call it a golden goodbye?

7:33Camilla: It's more like a two-fingered salute to Peter Mandelson and indeed the taxpayer.

7:38Tim: It's not as golden as the amount he initially asked for, which is over£500 ,000. Yeah, punchy. The government insists that it got, quote, value for money by knocking him down to£75 ,000. But we have a story that says that Rachel Reeves' deputy, James Murray, may have broken the ministerial code by agreeing to the payoff. Because according to the code, ministers must ensure value for money and must abide by the requirements set out in a document called Managing Public Money. This document says the department should not sign off on severance payments to avoid, quote, unwelcome publicity or reputational damage.

8:11Tim: And as we mentioned yesterday, in those documents, there is a communication which seems to suggest that officials were concerned that if they didn't give Peter Mandelson something, then he would go public. A number of politicians, for instance, Labour's Douglas Alexander, have said that the money should be given to charity. That's not something you can compel Peter Mandelson to do. I'm sure he does actually have some expenses that the 75 grand is necessary to cost. But also I'd like to remind those politicians, it's not Peter's money.

8:41Camilla: No.

8:41Tim: It's taxpayers' money.

8:43Camilla: No.

8:43Tim: You're requesting that someone who got taxpayers' money give my money to someone else.

8:48Camilla: I know.

8:49Tim: I'd rather he just gave it back to me.

8:51Camilla: Well, he could give it back to you. Or to be fair, I suppose Sir Ed Davey is in the think of the victims mould and is thinking that really, if Mandelson had any sense of decency at all, if he really is sorry and regrets his association with Epstein, then he should probably give that money to an organisation that helps the victims of sex trafficking, for instance.

9:13Tim: Again, that's up to Mandelson, but I'm going to double down on this. We are not in the business in this country of giving individuals large pots of taxpayer cash and then saying you might want to give that to a nice cause. That's just not how the tax system is supposed to work.

9:27Camilla: I didn't sign up to that. No, as you said yesterday, there is something venal about him leaving in such disgrace, but clawing as much money as he could back from his contract.

9:36Tim: With the threat of an industrial tribunal hanging over the government.

9:39Camilla: Now, let's just go back to September the 10th, 2025, Tim. This is important now because Kemi Badenot, the leader of the opposition, has said this this morning.

9:51Tim: It is very clear that he told lie after lie after lie about the appointment of Peter Mandelson. He wanted to make this all about Peter Mandelson. This is about his judgments. He has been dishonest with Parliament and with the country. And Labour MPs, in good conscience, should be looking at whether or not this man should be leading our country.

10:09Camilla: Now, why is she saying that? She's going back in time to the moment that Keir Starmer expressed confidence in Peter Mandelson. As you and I have discussed, just a day later, Peter Mandelson resigned. But what's crucial in these parliamentary exchanges is the number of times the Prime Minister insists that due process was followed. He actually uses that phrase on three separate occasions.

10:38Tim: Was the Prime Minister aware of this intimate relationship when he appointed Lord Mandelson to be our ambassador in Washington? Mr Speaker, as she and the House would expect, full due process was followed during this appointment, as it is with all ambassadors. That was the first time he used the phrase. Here's the second. Part of the appointment, there will have been extensive government vetting, including details and timings of Peter Mandelson's dealings with Jeffrey Epstein. So will the Prime Minister publish all these documents, including those about his interests? Well, Mr Speaker, as I say, full due process was gone through in relation to this appointment, as would be expected.

11:20Camilla: Those first two, Tim, were to Kemi Badenock, and then he said the phrase again to Ed Davey.

11:26Tim: Has the Prime Minister asked the ambassador what other compromising material the Trump administration might have on him as he leads Britain's negotiations with the White House? Well, Mr Speaker, as I've made clear to the House, a full due process was gone through when the appointment was made.

11:46Camilla: So, Tim, this is the question for Keir Starmer. Let's just point out the former director of public prosecutions. Can you possibly claim that due process was followed if you are given a document that mentions the reputational risk of appointing Mandelson on numerous occasions, that clearly points out the closeness of his relationship to Epstein, and we now know, and maybe he did comment elsewhere, that there is an empty box where the Prime Minister's response to all of this should have been. If there's an empty box, then the whole of the process can't have been followed because the Prime Minister doesn't appear to have reacted to the information, the evidence that was presented to suggest repeatedly that appointing this guy was a very, very bad idea that would reflect badly on him personally.

12:51Camilla: So is that following due process?

12:53Tim: Well, Kemi Badenock would like the answer to be no so that she can say the Prime Minister has misled the House. If that is the case, then that doesn't actually lead to anything. It doesn't matter if you mislead the House. It's a convention that that's a bad thing and that you ought to apologise for it. But it doesn't get you disqualified from Parliament. It doesn't send you to jail. Nonetheless, it will be a great political win for her. And there is one interpretation, which is what we infer from Jonathan Powell, that the process was super rushed. So due process was not followed. The second interpretation, which I favour, is due process was followed.

13:29Tim: and the Prime Minister ignored it.

13:31Camilla: Yes.

13:31Tim: That to me seems more likely. I mean, we have a document which suggests a box-ticking exercise, in fact, a box-filling exercise, in which officials have put loads of pretty sound advice, which has proven to be correct, and it was obviously ignored.

13:46Camilla: Yeah. So I suppose the kind of key premise then is it's not even with the benefit of hindsight that we can say that if due process was followed, Peter Mandelson wouldn't have been appointed. We can say that at the point that the Prime Minister was given this dossier because if you followed the due process and listened to what you were being told in the dossier, if you followed due process through to its full conclusion, there is no other conclusion you really could have drawn bar, goodness me, we'd better not appoint him because of all of his associations, let alone with Epstein, and because of the reputational risk to me, Now, the Prime Minister's defence to all that is, but when we asked Peter about all this, he said there was nothing in it.

14:34Camilla: Is that following due process? Is believing Peter Mandelson's lies a full exercise of the following of due process? Or is it a case of a Prime Minister either being duped or turning a blind eye because he felt that this appointment was politically beneficial to him?

14:54Tim: As someone said, this is the first time in his political life that Keir Starmer took a gamble and it horribly backfired.

15:01Camilla: Yes.

15:01Tim: Normally he does everything by the book to a degree, which is many people find aggravating and annoying. Some might say his handling of Iran and the use of American bases was so by the book or the Chagos Islands was so by the book because international law says you have to hand them over, etc, etc. This is the first time in his life in which he's been given official advice and seems to have gone, I don't care. I'm going to appoint him anyway because Morgan McSweeney says he's fine. In which case, what does that say about his judgment that when he does take a risk, it's a really bad one? Why does all this politically matter?

15:32Tim: Because, hey, Labour has a massive majority and surely he can ride this out. Well, it's worth listening to this speech by Clive Lewis, the Labour backbench MP in Parliament when they were discussing the release of these documents. This isn't just about technicalities, about lapses of judgment. This is about a wider, rotten political culture, a 30 year project where proximity to wealth and power isn't a means to an end. It is the end goal. That's what Peter Manilson represented. And he wasn't just about him being the ambassador or selected to be ambassador. He was at the heart of the political project around number 10.

16:14Tim: That has to change. Does the government understand out there this isn't just about one bad set of decisions? It's about a political culture that he represents and that is destroying party politics, mainstream party politics in this country. Do we get that? Do we understand that? Will we change? So what you just heard Clive say is really important because it goes to the heart of why Labour is so angry about this, why the backbench is so angry, because they see it as an indictment of new Labour, of a political project which abandons socialism for what? Yes. For money and power and it compromised them and it means you end up with a prime minister who in their eyes isn't doing socialism.

16:55Tim: No. It's just in office but not in power and is surrounded by the same kind of rich, venal people that you could have had under the Tories. So the backbenchers are getting very angry about this. And Kemi Badenot claims that some Labour MPs are reaching out to the Tory whips about a possible vote of no confidence. Now that does matter.

17:14Camilla: Yes.

17:14Tim: Because if you lose one of those, the government falls. Or even if you narrowly win it, the damage is already done. Because people can look forward and say they will lose the next one.

17:24Camilla: The trouble is with this argument is, are the Lewises and the Rachel Maskells and the Richard Bergens and the John McDonalds and the heavy Blairite critics of this world really going to side with the Tories?

17:39Tim: Yeah, I don't believe her. But I think there's a big difference between having serious strategic conversations, like famously in the past, Michael Foote conspiring with Enoch Powell to stop Lord's reform, or Harold Wilson conspiring with Enoch Powell over defeating a membership of the common market and things like that.

17:59Camilla: Yeah, but they're big things. They're big people with big things.

18:02Tim: I suspect what's happened is a lefty Labour MP has bumped into someone in the canteen and has said, oh, he's not gone long. And that's being translated into their support for a no confidence vote. But nonetheless, okay, so maybe he can't be brought down that way, But it could mean that people are more likely to rebel over key legislation.

18:24Camilla: Yes.

18:25Tim: Because they don't like the man who's proposing it. And so they don't trust his judgment.

18:29Camilla: There's also, by the way, I think, a quite key concern about a lack of scrutiny here of the prime minister himself. The timing of PMQs and then Darren Jones. So this is the chief secretary to the prime minister speaking afterwards about this whole issue and releasing the files. meant that Keir Starmer couldn't be directly scrutinised by Kemi Badenock in the House because by that point he's left. Yes. We then get the files.

18:53Tim: So we have to wait until next Wednesday.

18:55Camilla: We have to wait until next Wednesday and no doubt more developments in Iran will take place overnight and into the weekend. Yes, he might get lucky.

19:03Tim: World War III might break out.

19:04Camilla: Well, it possibly already has. So we're just now in this holding pattern. So this is all now in terms of the politics of it all whether Badenock is going to be able to keep this on the front pages. between now and next Wednesday. Isn't it a shame, by the way, that common sense isn't enshrined in international law? Because Starmer could have consulted his friend Lord Hermer.

19:30Tim: That's a very good point.

19:30Camilla: Who could have provided some great legal advice on the idiocy of appointing Peter Mandelson. And Starmer could have said, I'm sorry, but in the interest of international law, which has enshrined the policy of common sense, We just can't possibly do this.

19:45Tim: If only the United Nations had passed a resolution against Jeffrey Epstein a couple of years ago, this would never have happened.

19:53Camilla: Yes, or the International Court of Justice had made a decision.

19:57Tim: Or Oxfam or the WWF. Anyone, but not the officials.

20:04Camilla: Well, aside from Starmer and the Mandelson files, Tim, there's another subject that has been exercising the Telegraph audience.

20:11Tim: For the past year, the Labour government has been working on a definition of Islamophobia. It's settled on one of anti-Muslim hate. We speak to the man who helped author it, Dominic Grieve, and ask, is this just a blasphemy law through the back door?

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21:40Tim: We're now joined by Dominic Grieve, KC, a prominent barrister. You were a member of parliament for the Conservative Party and then latterly as an independent. Your top position in government was attorney general for England and Wales, and you were tasked by Labour with coming up with a definition for anti-Muslim hate. So my first question is, why do we even need a definition of anti-Muslim hate when it's already illegal in this country to discriminate on the basis of race or religion? It's a fair question and there are some people who think that we shouldn't have any definitions at all. It's worth bearing in mind, however, that we have a definition of anti-Semitism and when we took evidence about whether we should have a definition of anti-Muslim hatred, it was clear that the majority of people who came in front of us thought that the definition of anti-Semitism had been helpful in identifying what the issues were and therefore being able to tackle them.

22:39Tim: So the reason for having a definition of anti-Muslim hatred is that firstly, we've got to face up to the fact that anti-Muslim hatred is becoming a very prevalent phenomenon. Lots of people going about their lawful business, living in peace with their neighbours, are getting abuse and harassment from complete strangers because they are identified as being Muslims. If you go online and go and look on X, there is a torrent of hostility and vitriol against Muslims, generically, irrespective of what their views may or may not be. And so, pragmatically, I think that if one can come up with a definition, which is the right one, then it helps identify the problem and it will then make it easier to address it.

23:29Tim: And it's worth bearing in mind that there are already out there a large number of definitions of anti-Muslim hatred, or sometimes the word used is Islamophobia, some of which I think are quite seriously flawed. And some of the issues one then picks up is that they are misunderstood or misapplied, and that just makes it even worse. So effectively, they are used to suppress legitimate freedom of expression or try to suppress it. So actually coming up with a definition which doesn't do that, which I believe ours does not, I think is a step in the right direction. But I should make clear, on its own, it doesn't solve anything.

24:08Tim: And I'm pleased that the government has announced a separate package, which I should emphasize we were not asked to advise on in detail, but we did make the point in the submission we made to government. We said on its own, this won't do anything. You have got to have somebody who is paying some attention to social cohesion in this country, because we are, I think, at risk of our social cohesion degrading. And as we have been historically a cohesive country with a lot of live and let live and a lot of tolerance, I think that's a very undesirable place for us to go.

24:39Camilla: Did you avoid the word Islamophobia on purpose in this definition?

24:44Tim: Most certainly, yes. Islamophobia is a word that's been around for about 20 years. It started as an expression used really in academic communities. Because given its literal English meaning, it means an irrational fear of something. But rationality and irrationality are things that we're all perfectly allowed to have. For many Muslims, the word has simply come to mean anti-Muslim hostility or anti-Muslim hatred. But it's right to say that given coming back to its ordinary English meaning, it means a fear of a religion. And people are entitled to be fearful of a religion or dislike a religion if they wish.

25:27Tim: That's part of our right in this country. What is worrying is when your dislike of somebody else's views or generically of a belief system translates into treating with completely casual hostility, complete strangers who indeed may not in fact share those views at all, because the reality is Islam is a hugely wide term and encompasses widely different belief systems within it. And if you were to do that, if you were to discriminate against someone on the basis of their faith, that would already be illegal. I mean, this is my point. So you're quite right. Every offence you've described against Muslim people is abhorrent and wrong.

26:13Tim: And it is also necessary that we have social cohesion. I think people would accept that. But what people like to cling to in this country is the idea of a colourblind or a faithblind social cohesion, that we treat people as individuals, not as parts of groups. And therefore, we just say that any kind of discrimination on the basis of faith, on the basis of race is wrong. Why do you need to single out a particular group? I agree with the first part of your premise completely. And as I said at the beginning, I can see that there is an argument that we should not have any definitions of any kind at all.

26:49Tim: But we are a pragmatic country. And if there is a problem, I don't think it's wrong to try and approach it pragmatically. If you look at the definition, the first part of it really deals with criminal offences, which are already criminal offences. the last part deals with the Equality Act, although it's tighter than that because you can breach the Equality Act and discriminate against somebody without intending to stir up hatred against them. You can do it negligently or you can do it by mistake. So the middle part is, I think... This is the most controversial bit. I'm well aware of that. But it is, in my view, well drafted because I don't think a government has a duty to be neutral about the issue of people expressing views generically with the intention of stirring up hatred against groups, irrespective of the views of the individuals.

27:45Tim: Now, they may still do it, and it won't be a criminal offence. It's worth bearing in mind this is a non-statutory definition. But if somebody within my employment, if I were an employer and somebody was doing what that middle paragraph is saying within my business, I would tell them to stop. And I'd be right to. I just want to read it because I think it is the toughest bit of the definition. Anti-Muslim hostility is also the prejudicial stereotyping of Muslims or people perceived to be Muslim, including because of their ethnic or racial backgrounds or their appearance, and treating them as a collective group defined by fixed and negative characteristics, with the intention of encouraging hatred against them, irrespective of their actual opinions, beliefs or actions as individuals.

28:29I think my problem with singling out this as a definition is for the following reasons.

28:36Camilla: We already know in this country that it is more problematic to criticise Islam than any other religion. And I say that because we've got evidence for it. The Batley school teacher who put a cartoon of Muhammad up on a board is still in hiding five years on from having to lose his job and his position. We had another situation where a child dropped a Koran and was subject to some kind of community expose. I would suggest that even in journalism, you have to watch yourself. I can be very critical of my own religion, Catholicism, Christianity. I could be critical of Judaism as a Christian and say, of course, Jesus isn't still to come.

29:22Camilla: I could be critical of Hindus. I could be critical of Sikhs. But we have to really watch ourselves if we are criticising the religion of Islam because of community backlash that is completely disproportionate to my exercising of free speech.

29:40Tim: And this people might say this validates that.

29:43Camilla: And so therefore you're almost doubling down on this uniqueness of not being able to criticise this religion when other religions are fair game. That's my concern about it.

29:56Tim: I understand that. And all the examples you've given are deplorable. And there is, in my view, a lot of evidence that there are extremists who are Muslims who try to push such an agenda. And I think that's something which needs to be addressed as well. But they've all happened without having a definition. I happen to think that this definition will make it less likely, particularly if it's linked to the other measures which the government is taking, I think it will make it less likely that this sort of thing won't be picked up and stopped. So I accept it's quite a finely balanced issue. But against that, you've got to understand the damage that is being done to our social cohesion within Muslim communities, most of which are not interested in these examples, which you give at all, are leaving perfectly law-abiding lives, mixing with their neighbours, working and contributing to our society, but are finding themselves at the receiving end of increasing abuse.

31:04Tim: and there's no doubt at all that some of it, the social media aspects of this, are now getting really quite serious. The stuff on social media, which is indeed uncontrollable, because a lot of it comes from the United States, really is not in any way different from the sort of stuff the Nazis were pushing out against the Jews in the 1930s in Germany. In which case, if it's that bad, why is this not a law? This is guidance. It's not statutory. Well, that's a matter for government. I personally would not wish to see this turned into a law, but it was not within our remit that that was where we were asked to produce non-statutory definition.

31:38Tim: That would require something completely different and doubtless for the very reasons you've given. It would also be controversial and I think might be very hard to craft. What's needed is a bit of focus on this and people of goodwill to come together, both to deal with the nonsense of the extremist end of this, which is undoubtedly, it's a cycle which just feeds on each other. So the more you get Islamist extremists saying very unpleasant things, the more people then start to attribute that to the views of all Muslims in the United Kingdom. And we ought to make a collective effort at trying to tackle it.

32:16Tim: I think the definition helps. I certainly set out with the rest of the working group with the idea of do no harm. Whether it will do good, I hope it will, but do no harm. And I think that's applied to the other members of the working group as well. And they were all Muslims.

32:32Camilla: My concern, and I am somebody who has been accused of Islamophobia for reporting the following. Concerns about women being subjugated in Muslim communities. Concerns about the low economic activity, particularly of Bangladeshi and Pakistani women coming to this country. Concerns about the low take-up of English and the low spoken English among some in the Muslim community. Concerns about primary school girls being made to wear hijab in Muslim schools. Concerns about a run in Tower Hamlets that excluded women and girls over the age of 12. OK, these are all perfectly legitimate concerns to raise about some of the practices within the religion of Islam.

33:21Camilla: And yet at the same time, I'm accused of being a racist for pointing them out. That's why I worry about this, because I think that my critics will latch onto this and use it as a stick with which to beat people who raise perfectly legitimate concerns about why some practices within Islam do not appear to be compatible with either British values or indeed women in 2026.

33:48Tim: I understand that, but I think you're mistaken. Read the definition. You're not intending to incite hatred against anybody by raising these points. They're perfectly legitimate points for debate in a pluralist society. They're perfectly legitimate things to raise, and you are entitled to criticise Islam as a religion and its practices. All that is absolutely clear, and indeed it's made clear in the notes to the definition. So I just don't think this definition is going to have any impact on preventing you from doing that. Now, that may not mean that you're still not accused of Islamophobia, but for the reasons I've given, I hope that we're getting away from that term because I don't think it's very helpful.

34:29Tim: But the context in which this is being produced is one in which police forces have been encouraged to record non-crime, hate crime incidents. And also one in which we have been told that racism is not just a matter of intent, but also perception. And I guess that Camilla might say, can she write those things without fear? That because you have defined anti-Muslim hate this way, someone will read this document, read what Camilla has written, and then say, well, I perceive, whether that was her intention or not, I perceive that she is committing some sort of anti-Muslim hate crime.

35:03Camilla: And then I have an Alison Pearson-esque knock at the door.

35:06Tim: And even if it's not the law, because we're in a situation in which the police still have to listen, you're creating even more trouble for Kamilar and fellow journalists. The only use of the word perception in the definition is about the fact that non-Muslims who are thought to be Muslims are often at the receiving end of hatred because they are thought to be Muslims. You get examples of Sikhs particularly who are confused in the mind of those who are doing this. So coming back to your point, I just don't think that that will happen. And indeed, if the government sets up a proper social cohesion unit, you should be entitled to some verbal protection from whoever is appointed to run it.

35:50Tim: So I think those are all positive steps in the right direction. Of course, at the end of the day, you talk about knocks on the door and on the doorstep. All of us who put ourselves out into the public sphere and say things, as I discovered at the height of the Brexit crisis in 2019, get death threats from people. This, I'm afraid, is one of the more unpleasant sides of modern politics, particularly fuelled by social media. And I'm afraid there is a point where one says we have to live with it and we just have the courage to get on with it. So this isn't a cure-all, but I do happen to think it's a step in the right direction.

36:28Tim: And above all, because as I said earlier, there are a large number of places in this country where people are operating their own definitions. Often created for perfectly valid and good reasons, but open, I think, to misapplication quite easily. And I actually think this one is much more robust.

36:47Camilla: Who's going to use the guidance? We've discussed the police, the CPS, the judiciary, schools, because on one hand, you could say, look, this isn't going to be binding in legislation. So it's just guidance. But we've also seen guidance over interpreted. And I'll use the example of trans guidance. We got into a situation where guidance was produced. Schools followed it, caught up in a wave, caught up in a transgender trend. They then appear to be backed up by the Department for Education. And some of the outcomes were hugely disturbing. For instance, we reported at this newspaper of the guidance being interpreted so widely that children were transitioning in school and their parents weren't being told about it.

37:32Camilla: So sometimes when the guidance isn't statutory, it can actually be more unwieldy than when it is.

37:40Tim: I entirely accept that, which is why the guidance has to be well crafted. And there was plenty of examples over guidance of trans issues that it was poorly drafted and being misapplied. And there is in the papers and on social media this morning a lot of comment about guidance, apparently in some schools in the north of the country, about what form art and what can be depicted by children in art class.

38:06Camilla: Yes, we reported in that, Dominic, and we have had a great many, thousands of comments condemning this in a Judeo-Christian country.

38:16Tim: Very understandably. Now, I haven't had a chance of reading the entire document, but from what I understand of it, it's nonsense. I have read it and it is nonsense. It is nonsense. The document actually just warns teachers that some Muslims may be uncomfortable. The point is, it's about leaving the pupils up to decide what they want to do. But the problem is, is you can just imagine a headteacher reading it, misunderstanding it and saying, look, to avoid any potential controversy, let's just not allow any drawing. That's the problem is interpretation. We're on the same page. Obviously, if you're running a school with Muslim children, you don't suggest to them that they should draw a picture of the holy prophet of Islam, because that is regarded for most Muslims, not all, but almost most, as being iconoclastic and improper.

38:59Tim: But on the other hand, it doesn't mean that you prevent people from doing a nativity card showing the Virgin Mary and the child Jesus or indeed depicting the crucifixion. It's obvious. And so often, and I'm sure you may find this, I am bemused at the utter idiocy of the way in which people try to apply even unwritten rules or unwritten ideas. I'm afraid this happens. And actually, I think this guidance will help in this. I realise the proof of the pudding is going to be in eating. But my personal view is that this will be helpful. And it will also have the consequence of providing, I think, reassurance for British Muslims that the issues to which they are being subject, the problems to which they're being subjected, which are now, I think, much more widespread than we understand, are being taken seriously.

39:59Tim: And I think that's important because ultimately, these problems are going to be best addressed when sensible Muslims, proud and secure in their faith, understanding also that they're living in a pluralist society, are able to make sure that those who are of more extreme views are marginalized. and because of the state of the world, including the Middle East and lots of other problems, that is not always happening and the loudest voices are the most extreme. I just want to add on the school's guidance because I find it so... It's a classic of the genre. The guidance was produced under a Tory government and it was run in Tory-run councils.

40:41Tim: A little detail which is getting ignored this morning. But, OK, here's where I think the big problem, the big challenge ahead lies. I suspect the reason why you've gone with anti-Muslim hate, not Islamophobia, is because you want to make this about human beings and individuals, not criticism of theology. Well, that's quite right. The thing is, though, that Muslimness is a manifestation, in many cases, of someone's religion. So if you criticize Muslimness, if you criticize an individual on the basis of their Muslimness, you are being drawn into a discussion of the validity of the theology itself.

41:15Tim: So, for instance, there is a live conversation in this country, which I suspect we need to have about the relationship between Islam and women's rights. There's tension there, issues like face coverings. And my worry is that if you're going to say with this guidance, you cannot generalize, you cannot stereotype, so you can't presumably say things like, you're a Muslim woman, presumably you don't have as strong a rights as your husband does, or presumably your husband mistreats you, or you're a Muslim man, presumably you look down on your wife and your daughters. Okay, there are some bigots who just want to be nasty about Muslims, but there is also a genuine interrogation about faith there going on, which I think is a legitimate discussion.

41:54Tim: And my concern is that bad faith actors are going to use your attempts to defend Muslims against discrimination as an opportunity to shut down debate about the thing that probably most defines them in their life, which is their religion. But we've just heard in this conversation we're having that this is happening already. Question is, is this definition going to make it better or worse. I think it will make it better. Of course, these are legitimate subjects to debate. I'm a Christian. I'm a practicing Anglican Christian. If people wish to criticize my faith or my practices, they are open and free to do it.

42:33Tim: And in the same way, when I was in Parliament, I was leading light in getting the blasphemy law repealed. And actually, I was also the leading, along with David Davis, we were the two leading parliamentarians that got the Labour rebellion, which got incitement to religious hatred amended to require intent and to take out abusive and insulting language because comedians said we will be at risk. That's where I stand on this. And I certainly wouldn't be allowing a definition to go forward, which I was uncomfortable with. I think it correctly encapsulates what the issues are for British Muslims. It's their lived experience and a real problem for them.

43:19Tim: And I think it needs to be addressed. And as I say, there is a wider package of measures that the government's come up with, which I'm also pleased about. And in many ways, those are likely to be more important in making progress than the definition itself. But the definition does help identify the problem. and whilst it's possible that people will try to misuse it, inevitably anything is capable of being misused or people may try. I don't think it'll be successful. I don't want to go around in circles, but again it's a question and we mustn't be naive about context. When it came to the rape gangs, we now know there were officials who did not want to properly investigate them for fear of being accused of what I think you're defining here.

44:02Camilla: Yeah, anti-Muslimness.

44:04Tim: Yeah. That may well be the case, but I think it's also worth bearing in mind that a lot of it, I'm afraid, and I've said this in the past, has to do with politics. If you are or you see yourself as dependent on a particular community vote, and we've after all seen it in the recent Gorton by-election, then I'm afraid, I think, my impression, having taken an interest in this subject for some time, is it's a tendency to gloss over issues. Mr. Grieve, I'm going to accuse you of anti-Muslim hate there. You're implying that Muslims vote as a bloc and they just vote for whoever their community elders tell them to vote for.

44:46Tim: Hold on a moment. That's not what I'm saying. Actually, I don't think they do vote as a bloc, but the perception by some politicians that they are available as a bloc... Never argue with a lawyer. It's impossible. ..has been the issue that has troubled me, which is a different thing altogether, and that's a matter in which political parties need to look at their own ethical standards.

45:10Camilla: Can I just ask a question about timing here? And I do appreciate what you're saying about the growing levels of anti-Muslim hatred. But haven't we got a much bigger, more obvious problem with the growing levels of anti-Jewish hatred? The last time I checked, Muslim students weren't being driven off university campuses. The last time I checked, people weren't calling for Muslim armies. We weren't calling for death, death to Muslim armies in the streets. We weren't calling for Muslims to be in the ground at Oxford University. We weren't marching outside mosques and intimidating Muslims. Only this weekend, Dominic Grieve, we witnessed one man at a so-called peace marsh call for the return of Mohammed's army, which famously slaughtered Jews in the 7th century.

45:56Camilla: I think if you called for that on the streets of Britain, you would rightly be criminalised. We don't see the same response. So I would suggest that if you're Jewish in the UK right now, you'd be thinking, why on earth is the government prioritising anti-Muslim hate when we are the victims of arguably the highest levels of anti-Semitism since the Second World War? Nobody would be abusing Muslims in the street as Jews and Israelis have been abused since October 7th. It just isn't happening.

46:31Tim: I agree that there's a serious issue with anti-Semitism, as I have many Jewish friends. It's a very serious problem. We have a definition of anti-Semitism. That, I think, was in part the response by the last government to the issue. But it has undoubtedly grown much worse since. And there's no doubt that the current events in the Middle East crystallize it. And there are people who fail completely to distinguish between the actions of the Israeli government and the wider Jewish community, many of whom do not support the actions of Israel. And so there are serious issues there that need to be tackled.

47:07Tim: But I will simply point out that we were not told in the course of the evidence we took, which included evidence from within the Jewish community. Nobody suggested that we were wrong in looking at this issue of anti-Muslim hatred. Finally, I want to raise a point made by the Free Speech Union, which is they say this conflicts with the occupying the field doctrine of law, which says that you can't produce something where there's already law covering it and it could potentially contradict it. Now, I suspect you're just going to say that's the government's problem. But do you see this being resolved by what you have written, turning into law and being integrated into the statute books?

47:46Tim: No, I never intended to see this be incorporated into law. I don't think it's necessary. It's there as a guidance document for public authorities. And that's where I expect it to be used. Never the intention that it should be turned into law. And if somebody said to me that they wanted to turn it into law, I would say it's not necessary, precisely because I think the law as it stands is sufficient. And if the law as it stands is not sufficient, we've got to go back to the drawing board. I certainly wouldn't use this as a basis for change. As for the Free Speech Union, yes, I understand they were going to mount a judicial review of the government's decision.

48:21Tim: I shall wait with interest to see the outcome of that. But I have to say that I don't find it easy to see myself that adopting a non-statutory definition of this kind falls foul of any legal principle. But we will see.

48:37Camilla: Dominic Grieve, KC, formatory MP. Thank you very much indeed for joining us on The Daily Tea.

48:43Tim: Thank you.

48:47Camilla: Tim, before we go, could you lend me a fiver so I can get some lunch?

48:51Tim: Let's see. What have I got in here? This is so staged. There it is. And look at this handsome devil on the£5 day. Look at this. Never in the field of human conflict.

49:02Camilla: Oh, the Queen, it's an oldie. So we have the Queen and we have Churchill. But wouldn't we like Churchill, the greatest Briton that ever lived, to be replaced by a squirrel or a badger?

49:12Tim: Where doesn't Labour go the whole hog and replace him with a white flag?

49:17Camilla: I love that you're now thinking in my terms. At the end of a week which started with you channelling your inner Jeremy Corbyn, you've now come to the dark side. This is an aberration. Why on earth are we considering replacing the likes of Churchill, Jane Austen, Turner, Turing with little beasties, little critters, otters, squirrels?

49:39Tim: Can I be boring and say it's not actually the government's decision? I don't care. I blame Starmer. And also it's something that we do every 10 years anyway. In the past, the fiver was Wellington, then it was George Stevenson, and then it was Elizabeth Fry. And you can tell someone's age, but what they can remember was on the£5 note. And it used to be nothing. So it's just come around. But the problem is it's context, because we happen to be going through a period in which it feels like we're retreating from the world stage and we can't send a ship anywhere anymore. and to replace Churchill with a hedgehog at that moment.

50:09Tim: No, it's wrong. I think it's very unfortunate. Also, hedgehogs are the sort of thing that countries do where they're nervous about their history. The way the EU, it can't put any faces on notes. I'm sure readers, listeners will correct me and say they do that now, but I believe until they don't put faces on notes because they can't agree on who is a national hero of the European Union. So you end up with viaducts instead and things like that.

50:34Camilla: Well, rather a viaduct than replacing Fry with a ferret.

50:37Tim: I say, let's have a bit of fun. I want, on the£5 note, I want Derek Trotter.

50:42Camilla: Yes.

50:42Tim: From Only Fools and Horses with the motto, this time next year we'll be millionaires.

50:47Camilla: Or just other iconic figures from British culture, like, for instance, Bungle from Rainbow. Oh, wouldn't that be lovely?

50:53Tim: Yes.

50:56Camilla: Or who else could we think of?

50:57Tim: Or John Inman from Are You Being Served? On the£50 note with the motto, I'm free.

51:02Camilla: Love that. or let me think, who else? Have a bit of fun.

51:06Tim: Because I think everything we do should be done to fox foreigners.

51:10Camilla: Yeah. So they look at these people

51:12Tim: and let foreigners look at it and see Mrs Slocum and think, is this Queen Elizabeth I?

51:17Camilla: And where's her pussy? And equally, couldn't we just have Harry Enfield loads of money? Yes. Come on. Can I have that fiver?

51:24Tim: No, you can't.

51:24Camilla: OK, you're going to frame it in the toilet because it's the last time we'll see Churchill on a banknote. No one uses cash anyway. I know. We'll be back tomorrow, 5pm.

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