Can TV drama deliver justice in the real world?

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1:25Hello and welcome to The Rest is Entertainment with me, Marina Hyde. And me, Richard Osman. Hello, Marina. Hello, Richard. It is very nice to be back. It's lovely to be back. How is 2024 treating you? It's treating me incredibly. I've only recently come back from being in Austria, so I'm having the re-enter to the atmosphere. I have to tell you, it has literally not stopped raining here for the entire year. Yes, I know. I saw. We've got a biblical year in store for us. It's going to be arcs and floods all the way through here, from here to December. That's my prediction. Some interesting things to talk about.

1:57We've got some very interesting things to talk about. We're going to talk about Mr Bates in the post office, the ITV drama, and the ramifications of it, the fallout of it. The impact of it. The impact of it. Can we talk about The Traitors, which is back on the BBC? There will be no spoilers. There will be absolutely zero spoilers from either of us. But we are going to talk about how we would win The Traitors, what tactics and strategy we would use to win The Traitors. I feel like you're going to be better at this than me, but I have got some ideas. I think I've seen a chink in their armour. I think I've seen that.

2:27I also want to talk at the end a little bit about Luke Littler, the 16-year-old darts player, and the phenomenon that that became and how everyone fell in love with darts and what that means and sport on TV and stuff like that. And I think maybe we'll talk about the Golden Globes. The Golden Globes happened last night. We're recording this on a Monday, and we'll talk about that and which sort of formally kick off awards season for the movies. We've got a lot to talk about. Post office scandals, traitors, darts and Golden Globes. Yes, please. That's a commute I want to be on. Shall we? Right then, shall we?

2:57Yeah, come on. Miss Debates versus the Post Office. Now, this is ITV's dramatisation of the story of the wrongly convicted Postmasters, which aired on consecutive nights last week and is available on Catch Up on ITVX. Now, I'm just going to do a bit of background because I guess the whole point about, a large part about why we're talking about this is, this is a story that's sort of gone under people's radar for various reasons which we'll come to. And you have written about this for a number of years. I have written about this for some time. I was by no means the first people to start writing about it were writing about it way back in 2009.

3:27We will come to those as well. I should say first that it is the most widespread miscarriage of justice in British legal history. It is a tale of complete corporate psychopathy in which the victims were that very backbone of England, postmasters and postmistresses. In 1999, basically, what happened is that the post office installed by decree a new computer system called Horizon, which began throwing up errors in people who ran post offices in their accounts. And they were sort of forced to make up the shortfalls. And they were told that it wasn't happening to anyone else. There was a helpline you could ring.

4:02People lost their businesses. They borrowed from everyone. They lost their homes. And eventually the post office began prosecuting them. Around 900 were prosecuted. 736 were convicted on faulty evidence and I'm afraid it's pretty clear that that evidence was knowingly faulty hundreds went to jail now they were imprisoned pregnant they're still in their teens in one case on their young child's birthday in old age high security jails where they saw and suffered themselves terrible things at least 60 have died without seeing justice or compensation and at least 4 have taken their own lives they were shunned they've been put into physical and mental problems from which they've never recovered, but not one of the people responsible for this miscarriage of justice has ever been brought to justice or even been held accountable.

4:49There is an inquiry ongoing. Again, we'll come to it. But ITV have dramatised this story. Alan Bates, who is one of the wronged postmasters, who has masterminded the campaign, which has been beyond uphill struggle. It was like a war, really, one of the victims said this weekend, and you can believe it. He's played by Toby Jones in the drama. and it's been, this is a story, it's had a huge impact on people. Talking to people at ITV, they screened it in this part of January which is the very best viewing of the year really and they really pushed it and I must say that I was speaking to people that some people, a million downloaded it and watched the whole season in one go which is like off the charts on binge watching.

5:35Have you seen it Richard? Yes, I saw all four episodes and it's fascinating isn't it because it's a genuinely, mind-bogglingly, awful story. It's awful what happened to these people. And it's awful that it was done, as you say, it seems to have been done knowingly. Now, people have been writing about this for a while. Computer Weekly were the first people to bring it up at all. Private Eye have written about it. You've written about it a lot. So it's a story that I felt... I do not go right back to the beginning on this one, and I should say that right from the start, but Nick Wallace, the journalist for the BBC, who, I mean, this is not denigrating local news at all.

6:12He was a fantastic, and he's now a freelancer, but he details very well in his book, Great Post Office Scandal. I mean, the struggle to get a tiny item on local news about it, on local TV news, was huge, and he kept plugging, and it's extraordinary that it's taken this long. It's really a sort of over 20-year story. It's fascinating that it takes a terrestrial television drama, that much maligned species that we're told no one watches anymore to really raise it to the biggest story in the country, a real lightning rod. So suddenly the politicians are having to take it seriously. And it is an extraordinary thing that why people sort of cry conspiracy and incompetence about a million different things a day on Twitter and on Facebook, that this thing was staring us in the face.

7:00This is what it really looks like. It's absolutely extraordinary. This is, you know, in a way it has everything. It has all the ingredients for drama because it's a sort of tale of executives and computers being believed over ordinary people who, by the way, I mean, the least postmistresses, postmasters, the least gangsterish class out there. They're really pillars of their communities. And for this to happen, it's it could you sort of feel it could happen to anybody because if they if it could happen to so many people and such dreadful consequences. And then no one really, it never had the purchase on the public imagination.

7:35And I must say that the mainstream media in general have not, with some exceptions, have not been great at covering it. They're certainly covering it now. But, you know, don't worry if you're not fully caught up because the second best time to start caring about it is now. The Inquiry is running right now as we speak. You can watch it on their YouTube channel. It's really well run, the Inquiry. The Judge Wynne Williams is in charge of it and their YouTube channel is very good. and this week they've got Fujitsu, who are the people who are responsible for the Horizon computer system. People haven't been adequately compensated.

8:08There are three different schemes for compensation, none of which are properly adequate. And as I say, many people have died without receiving any of it. What I think is interesting, to talk about the drama itself, because that's what we do on this show. Yes, exactly. The screenwriter, Gwyneth Hughes, has had, I remember when I first heard about this, which was quite a long time ago, that it was going to happen. I was so thrilled they were going to do it. but I did think God I don't sort of envy you having to try and wrestle that material because the sheer scale of it trying to wrestle it into individual stories she used the figure of Alan Bates which is by far the best thing to do and to try and kind of get it she said that when she was writing it she had this sort of image in her mind of Avengers Assemble except instead of superheroes it was people in like woolly hats driving Austin minis and it's she's done she's done a fantastic job in making it very clear and I mean God what a sinister computer you know when you look at this like little computer system this horizon terminal beeping kind of malevolently away under these counters it really is a chill um and so i think she's done a sort of fantastic job itv have done a fantastic job in actually going for this story i have seen a lot of people on social media and other places saying well i'm really annoyed it's taken a television drama to bring this to to bring this to people's attention whereas why?

9:27That's absolutely fantastic for, as you say, a linear terrestrial broadcast drama to suddenly ignite the public consciousness like this. There are other examples and we can talk about some of those in a minute. But this is, that's really, isn't that a most wonderful story? And you know what? I was in touch with Rebecca Thompson, who we've talked about, who wrote the first Computer Weekly story about in 2009. None of these people, they're thrilled about what's happened in the drama. Whatever it takes to get it over the line, for whatever reason, the way you can like mass, raised mass consciousness about this, that television has done that, I think it's an incredible story.

9:59There are other stories out there. The loan charge scandal, these are things that people don't really know about, but which I hope people and broadcasters will think, well, hang on, let's get into that. What are other things we could do to kind of create these mass moments about something that's real and really happening now? And extraordinarily cast as well. I think, you know, you've got Toby Jones as Alan Bates. And I think it's a good rule of thumb if you're a politician or an executive somewhere and you're having trouble with somebody at the moment and you're trying to get one over on them.

10:26Just think, in 20 years' time, could the person I'm trying to get one over on possibly be played by Toby Jones in a drama on ITV? And if they could, then you're probably in the wrong. You're losing big time. But yeah, to have Toby Jones and Judy Hesman-Halge and Monica Dolan, just great ITV names. I kept expecting Jason Watkins to turn up, maybe in series two. It humanises the story so perfectly. But the material they are working with, it's so devastating. I mean, you want to throw things at the screen. The woman at the heart of this thing, Paula Venels. Now, Paula Venels has not been charged with anything.

11:07She's the subject of this current inquiry, one of the many subjects, but she's not been charged with anything. She got a CBE in 2019, the year 2019. So can she be all bad? That's all I'm saying. They wouldn't give her a CBE if she'd done something wrong. Alan Bates has refused his ABE while she still retains hers. oh that's great oh that's something to get behind in 2024 unless she's innocent unless she's innocent no it's Sarah Alan Bates I think which is Sir Alan Bates but wasn't Alan Bates the actor Sir Alan Bates was he oh right well I'm happy for him to be in the upper chamber quite frankly can he be in the House of Lords I'm quite happy for it yeah I think that Michelle Monout him in oh come on what a trainer one by one let's try and raise the bar promotion and relegation from the House of Lords we should that's something we could do this yes well I mean that is really what What the Lord's reform might look like.

11:54Exactly. Like the playoffs at Wembley. Yes. I think that there's something to be said. We're all in silos. I get it. We're all in bubbles. And, you know, people can shout and talk all they want about certain subjects. And it comes to the point where you're talking to a smaller and smaller group of people. There's something that only television can do and only terrestrial television can do. And that's get millions upon millions upon millions of people to watch something. And if you've got 5 million people, 6, 7 by the time all the ITVX figures are put in, that is quite a significant proportion of the British people and certainly enough of a proportion of the British people for this to be a genuine story.

12:32By the way, I think it's going to be a lot more than that. I think it could go up to 10 and I think it could be their biggest drama of the year. Which would be so great and such a testament to Alan Bates and to all the other incredible campaigners who've been through everything. But fascinating that politicians have learned over the last 10, 15 years that they can ignore almost everything because they recognize that everything is siloed and they recognize that after the first initial sort of flame of something, it burns out smaller and smaller, you know, gets smaller and smaller and then it disappears.

13:03So you can ignore stuff. Trump understands you can ignore stuff. Rishi Sunak has now understood. You have four news cycles a day. You can just turn it over onto something else. Exactly that. But everybody still recognizes, and you can see that Sunak recognises that sometimes a story leaps to the top of the agenda and is staying there. And ITV and terrestrial drama has done that this week. And actually, there are very few. I was looking back and I was trying to sort of make a... I'm sure I've left some out, but a little bit of an audit of these TV dramas that actually made a difference to public policy, to social consciousness about an issue.

13:36And there are really... Obviously, the first one that people say is Cathy Come Home, which was about a young family that come home become homeless and that's in 1966 that's directed by ken loach written by jeremy sanford that changed things not quite in almost in the public imagination people think it changed more who bombed birmingham again itv 1990 that was about the birmingham pub these are the things that they're very few that actually make a difference but this kind of catapulted that in uh story back to public consciousness and the actual interrogated the story and in the next year the Birmingham Six were exonerated in the Court of Appeal.

14:12Jimmy McGovern's Hillsborough was a huge part again for ITV was a huge part of getting public consciousness and pushing for the inquiry or inquiries as it turned out. But there weren't that many it's interesting that some of these haven't been on the most of these haven't been on the BBC. In the mid 80s they had stuff like Threads which really changed there was that kind of spate of kind of the idea of nuclear horror in America they had one which was called The Day After, I think. And there was one that the BBC made called The War Game, which was so shocking about what would happen in nuclear war that they couldn't broadcast it.

14:45And they ended up broadcasting it around that mid-80s moment. They didn't broadcast it for 20 years. Oh, wow. And we haven't had a nuclear war, so those worked. No, so those, yeah. But it contributed to people thinking, what are we doing here? And it contributed to the idea of weapons proliferation. By the way, I should say at time of recording, we haven't had a nuclear war. We haven't had, yes, please. We're recording this on Monday morning. This is the last thing you hear. I'm incredibly sorry. So you say the Inquiry, still ongoing. We can watch it on the YouTube channel of... You can watch it on the Post Office Inquiry YouTube channel.

15:14It's very easy to access and it will be starting again on Thursday the 11th of January. And we can play the game of who do we cast in Mr Bates versus the Post Office 2. Yes. Kudos to ITV and to everyone in that. But most kudos of all to Alan Bates and the incredible campaigners. And it's so lovely to have that story properly out there and in a way that's never going to be ignored again. Absolutely. Shall we move on? Shall we just do a slight one-show type gear change and talk about The Traitors? Yes, please. As I say, no spoilers. I absolutely promise you that. But the first three episodes have dropped.

15:45The next three episodes are dropping on Wednesday. We've watched the first three. I thought the fun thing to do, because I don't want to give away spoilers because people will watch this at different times, is talk about how we might go about winning The Traitors because when you watch, that's all you're doing, right? You're looking at how you would react. So The Traitors is a show where I think about 22 contestants are locked up in a Scottish castle. Three of them are made, around three are made traitors and the rest are called The Faithful. And they have to work out almost like a sort of game of wink murder.

16:16Who is a traitor and who is a faithful? And they have to undergo a few missions every, a different mission every day for fun. And at night they sit around something called The Round Table, which is the centerpiece of the show, where they accuse each other and also the traitors every night after that decide on one person to murder. And last year it was a huge first series on the BBC One, their biggest entertainment launch for years and years and years, a massive hit. First of all, would you rather be a traitor or a faithful? I would rather be a traitor. The clue is in the title. You surprised me.

16:48The traitors are on the game. Yeah, it's much harder to win as a faithful, although in the first series, in one of the first three series, some faithfuls have won, but I don't think that they were the greatest strategist. I think more of the game is luck. I certainly think it's easier being a traitor, that's for sure. You just have control over the game slightly there, in as much as anyone ever has control over the game. So talk me through how you would win the traitors. First of all... You walk in, day one. Day one. I've got to have a good social game. I know I have because it's so much... You also get these ones who appear in the first episode and say, I'm a master strategist, I'm really good at the stuff, that's how I'll win the game.

17:25it's like yes but you're not a very nice person we swiftly see those depart so I would do that I think if I was a faithful honestly if I was lucky enough I would try and identify the apex predator the most powerful traitor say to everyone it could never be him become friends with that person I don't know why I'm saying it as a man it might be a lady I could never be him or her it could never be the one person I know it isn't and say that all along get to the final and knife them there that's good but then you have to know who the traitor is Yeah, well, I bat myself. Because you read people. I'm a reader of people.

18:00Although, of course, one of the great satisfying things about the show is watching people who are really confident. They're confident enough to be on television, get it wrong every night and then be shown to have got them wrong every night because this is what we want to happen in real life. This is what we want to see. We're all around people all day long who are wrong but don't quite get it and maybe will never get it. And this is like watching very confident people be shown every day. Yeah, you're wrong about that. Yeah, you got that completely wrong. immediate consequence. It's such a beautiful, and there was a guy in the first series in the UK who was a magician.

18:29And he was, it was about three episodes in and he, you know what? He tired of the shenanigans, but he let the little people play their game. And he said, guys, you have to understand this is what I do for a living and I'm pretty good at it. I read people. I'm telling you now that John is a traitor. Listen, if he's not, get rid of me, but he is. Bye bye dick, hey? But we see that in public life all the time, right? That's all Twitter is. There's people going, the thing you don't understand about this situation and that I do understand is this. Hashtag, thank me later. So we see it all the time.

19:02And of course, those people never get proved wrong with you. If they do, it's months later. Yeah, on this. So he goes, yeah, it's John. Just read people. I just have an instinct that you guys don't have. And then, of course, John is faithful. And this guy's going, you know what? My bad. My bad. You're like, yeah. But everyone knows you're an idiot. Like we knew. But it's so lovely to see people get their comeuppance. A couple of clairvoyants haven't done as well as they might have done. Yeah, there's an Australian clairvoyant and there's a clairvoyant in this. I think that signal was blocked. There's a clairvoyant in this new one.

19:34But it's interesting to have a clairvoyant in there because the truth is everyone's name is mentioned at some point, right? People keep saying, oh, it's so-and-so, it's so-and-so, it's so-and-so. At some point, a clairvoyant can get lucky and get you. and also you know there might be if they suddenly go oh um paula yeah is the traitor and she actually is that's a problem for the traitors because there's enough people who go well the clairvoyant said it well it's a derrick akora situation yeah so i would always get rid of a clairvoyant immediately not because they actually know but because they can influence people there's a glitch in the first series of the traitors which is this you have to think about the show as a as a producer in the first series this is how we see each murder they discuss the murders they get it down to three people and then they're all sat down at breakfast and the people come in one by one until we discover who's been murdered but because it's TV we know they're discussing three people so the last person through the door who hasn't been murdered was always someone they had been thinking about murdering because as TV viewers we want it to be between my children identified this the other day and I was like, wow, how had I not thought of that?

20:44So you've got John or Mary. Yes. So in that first series, you would know exactly who was not a traitor by who came through the door last. Or surely if they repeated it for the second series because those people might not have thought it like that because they'd never seen the show out. Well, that's the thing. The second series, of course, they're changing it up because they're not idiots. Yeah. But if I was in there, the last person come through the door, I would take a side and say, listen, this is just between me and you, but I know for a fact you're not a traitor. And I would say that to everybody who came last through the door.

21:14And that would put a protective bubble around me. Firstly, the people thought I was trusted. I trusted them. So if they're faithful, they're like, oh, man, yeah, this is great. This is proof. But if they're a traitor, as you say, that's the way to make friends with an Apex traitor. So I can say, I know for a fact that you're definitely not a traitor. So that's what you have to do. All you've got to do in this game is survive for as long as you can. it's not about finding traitors this game at all it's just not because if you get rid of a traitor they replace the traitor the traitors are like the sugar babes you know they were there's there's a there's a never end they're exactly that they can just replace them so all you've got to do is get through to that last five and when you're there if you've been a faithful all along good luck but at some point you would have been made a traitor by that but you can't stay in that game that long and not have been i would like to be made a traitor sorry that's the other thing i would like to be recruited that works the key as we all know it's the key in life as well it's a key in every single reality show and yet people forget every single time is shut up for the first couple of episodes i mean honestly if you're a traitor or you're faithful keep quiet why are these people being do you know what i'm gonna lead this i think you're a traitor mate you could have just said nothing it's possible not to tweet it's just it's totally possible not to say anything it is Possible not to tweet is exactly right.

22:35And just keep quiet for a few weeks. It's like those people in The Apprentice who go, yeah, I'll be team leader first week. You think you've just moved your chances from being one of 20 people to get knocked out to one of two people. And no one will remember in week three that you said you were going to be the team leader. And in the traitors, it's the same. Don't accuse anybody. Don't be a character. Don't even wear an unusual hat. Don't peacock in any way whatsoever. I would always be sat down so people didn't realise I was really tall, because that would be enough. They'd go, do you know the thing about Richard?

23:07He's quite tall, isn't he? I'd have enjoyed seeing him on the missions try to achieve this, but yes. I think you'd have broken your cover there. You reckon? Yeah. Oh, yes. Why is he sitting down when he's swimming? It's so weird. Here's one of the key things about could you win the traitors, because we can sit here and chat about making alliances and not standing out too much. but I was talking to one of the producers of it and he said here's one of the key things you have to remember we do this at incredible speed he said they are locked up every single day someone's being banished and someone's being murdered every single day and then there's these loads and loads of film we've got to do the tasks and challenges the tension is ratcheted he said when they go into that round table they play that song The Hanging Tree from Hunger Games that's brilliant just to make it even more haunting And we've all been in situations with groups of people where we're thrown together where reality does become heightened.

24:04Yeah. You know, there is groupthink does happen. And however smart we like to think we are, it would happen to us as well. So they are under incredible pressure. Someone has a sort of full scale verbal collapse in one of these. Which is amazing. The first time I've heard the word am I or amunt I. But it's really. He keeps saying amunt. Yeah. And knows he's having it and is sort of having an out of body like. He's absolutely furious with his own great deal. I don't understand what's happened to me. I think he says, I thought I was tough and I'm sort of breaking here. I think what you have to be essentially is someone who's kind but incredibly good at lying, which is quite a rare combination.

24:41But the way I would get through it is always think as a producer. So as I say, the little trick with the last person through the door. Again, I talked to the producer, said, are you still doing that? He said, no, no, we've changed that. I thought that's slightly annoying, but I can still use it to my advantage one way or another. And to think, who was it most interesting? they've cast as a traitor. If I was the producer of this show, who would I cast as a traitor? Which of the quiet people would I cast as a traitor? And again, that thing of they always tend to go, maybe we should look at the quiet people.