Keir Starmer calls on Andrew to face US Congress

All right, let's go to London. The UK Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, has made a rare intervention, calling on Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor to face US Congress. This is over his links to the late sex offender, Jeffrey Epstein. Keir Starmer said, and I quote, a general principle I've held for a long time is that anybody who has got relevant information in relation to these kinds of cases should give that evidence to those who need it. That would be my general position on this. Joining us now is Spiked Online Chief Political Writer, Brendan O'Neill. Brendan, great to see you. I reckon there's more chance of Keir Starmer losing the Prime Ministership than Andrew testifying before Congress, is there not? Oh yes, there's a big chance of Keir Starmer losing soon. He's catastrophically unpopular. Having said that, he's probably got a lot of support on this question in particular. I think a lot of ordinary Brits would be in favour of Andrew answering questions about what he got up to with Jeffrey Epstein. And, you know, I can't see it happening myself. If you cast your minds back to when Andrew gave that interview to Emily Maitlis on BBC Newsnight, it was just, that was the thing that really did it for him. It really ruined his life because he was so useless and rubbish in that interview. So I can't see him doing it. I can't see him going over to America and making a fool of himself again. But I think a lot of people think he should do this. He should tell us what he knows. He should tell us the truth. And people want to know, you know, what went on on these islands and what was the role of this former prince of the realm when he went there. Absolutely, front up and be honest with the taxpayers. I think it's extraordinary that he's just, you know, now gone into hiding about it. Now, Brendan, the UK Home Secretary, Shabana Mahmood, claims that Britain is becoming more racist. She's arguing that racial intolerance would continue to escalate if anxieties surrounding immigration remain unaddressed. Brendan, has UK Labour not done this to themselves? You know, this is a tough one, you know, because I don't actually agree with her that Britain is becoming more racist, but I agree with her that it's becoming much more tense as a consequence of the immigration crisis. And that's a crisis that Labour has done absolutely nothing to resolve. I mean, just to give you a sense of how serious this is, around 750 mostly men arrive on Britain's shores in small boats every single day. That is a lot of people, and they are being put up in four star hotels. They're being given bed and board. They're often being put up in hotels in working class areas. And ordinary people are saying, look, how come we're down on our luck and struggling to make ends meet? And yet these arrivals from overseas are instantly given hotel rooms, given medical treatment, given food, and given a weekly allowance. It's really, really ticking people off. It really speaks to an unfairness in our asylum system. And it's causing huge tension, huge conflict even, social conflict. And I think that has to be sorted out. But whether it's giving rise to the kind of racism that Shabama Mahmood is talking about, I'm not sure about that. Where there is tension in this country, it is 100% the responsibility of government like hers. And unless they sort it out, there's gonna be trouble here. Well, speaking of instances of racism, I have got to ask you about a university professor who's been suspended after using the N word while on campus. Now, Peter Porman was labelled a potential risk to colleagues after discussing dictionary definitions. It was during an internal disciplinary hearing meeting where no students were present, but the University of Manchester is now examining whether his language in that meeting constituted racist and inappropriate conduct. Tell me more about this story. And does stuff like this make you fear for higher education? Absolutely, it does. And this is a perfect example of how stupid cancel culture is. Because as you say, this was an internal disciplinary hearing, there were no students present. So there was no one in the student body who could take offence from this professor's words. Also, he was discussing the dictionary definition of the N word. He wasn't using it as a form of racial abuse. Now, I think we can all agree that if he had called a black member of staff, a fellow colleague, the N word, then that would be a disciplinary issue. That would be something that would have to be sorted out. You can't do that in the workplace. But he was simply describing a word and giving the dictionary definition of it. People have to be free to be able to do that. We can't run scared from words within that kind of context when you're just having a cool discussion about what they mean. But it really sums up the cult of fragility on campus. And it really indicates that it's not just a problem amongst kind of crazy blue-haired students, but also amongst academics themselves, where they take offence at ordinary discussions about the meanings of words. I think the university in the 21st century has become this kind of factory of vulnerability where everyone is encouraged to take offence at everything. And that is not conducive to the pursuit of knowledge that a university is supposed to be doing. No, definitely not another example of stupidity from universities. Brendan, a study of BBC headlines since the October 7 attacks has found three times more were critical of Israel than of Hamas. The Telegraph is reporting references to Hamas committing possible war crimes appeared once in the broadcaster's coverage, while those featuring claims of Israeli genocide, famine and starvation appeared 45 times. Brendan, is this another example of this institutional bias that's continuing to plague Britain's public broadcaster? Yeah, the BBC's bias on Israel is out of control. I mean, it really is actually quite disgusting. And you see it every single night on News at 10. They just pump this anti-Israel propaganda into people's homes day after day. It's really quite disturbing. And as this new study finds, they're three times more likely to criticise Israel than they are to criticise Hamas. The recent Prescott dossier that caused a controversy a couple of weeks ago, that found that the BBC made so many mistakes on the Israel issue that it had to issue, on average, two corrections every week since 7th of October, 2023. And that's because it basically became a mouthpiece for Hamas. It was spreading Hamas propaganda, Hamas lies into people's homes every single day. And the consequences have been dire. Firstly, it has led people to believe things about Israel that are not true. But secondly, it has endangered the Jews of Britain. It has contributed to a crisis of anti-Semitism in this country, the like of which we haven't seen for a very long time. And I genuinely believe that BBC had a serious role to play in that. Abs, I completely agree with you. It's frightening. Brendan O'Neill, we have to leave it there. Thank you, as always, for joining us. Really appreciate it.