00:00Well, Birmingham, sadly, is being turned into a war zone, it's being called.
00:04After weeks of rubbish piling up on the streets,
00:07Local Government Secretary Angela Rayner has called in the army.
00:10She will use formal powers known as military aid to the civil authorities
00:15to summon the army to help with operational planning and expertise.
00:21Well, joining us now to discuss this is broadcaster Mike Parry.
00:25Mike, a terrible state of affairs in Birmingham, public health crisis,
00:29rats the size of cats, we're being told.
00:32But the army is just there to help with logistics. Is that right?
00:35Well, Amy's just told you under which particular rule the army is being invited in.
00:40And that was introduced for the army to quash civil disturbance.
00:46So, you know, the Labour politicians have been really searching through the rulebook
00:50to find out how they could do it.
00:52Lord Dannet, a former head of the British army,
00:56has warned about the dangers of using soldiers.
00:58And let's face it, we're in a very unstable world.
01:01You know, those soldiers might be needed somewhere else.
01:04But using soldiers to help clear rubbish,
01:07both the government and the army have pointed out
01:10that the soldiers will actually be logistically employed,
01:14i.e. they're good organisers,
01:16and they've got to move something like 17,000 tonnes of rubbish.
01:20But it's an almighty mess, particularly as we found out over the weekend,
01:24that Angela Rayner, the deputy prime minister,
01:28and the person who's in charge of trying to solve this strike,
01:31received £10,000 from the Unite Union,
01:36whose workers are primarily involved in this dispute.
01:39She received £10,000 from them to help her with her election campaign.
01:45So I think she's in a very invidious position.
01:47She's having to tell them to get back to work.
01:49She's pleading with them to get back to work.
01:51But they can rightly turn around and say,
01:54but we're your paymaster.
01:55We're not happy with the deal that we're being asked to vote on today.
01:59Later on today, there's going to be a ballot on what's called a partial deal.
02:05It's an offer which the union described as partial, but not good enough.
02:09So it looks like it's probably going to be rejected.
02:12But the government's in a terrible state.
02:14One of their own frontbenchers over the weekend,
02:17a Birmingham MP, said,
02:19I think it's awful that a small number of people,
02:22and she's talking about the bin collectors in the Unite Union,
02:26are holding the great city of Birmingham to ransom.
02:29So quite a part...
02:31I would have to say, Mike,
02:32I think it's awful that the great city of Birmingham
02:35goes to slash eight grand
02:37off people who are quite lowly paid in the first place.
02:41I think that's the really awful thing.
02:43And I think it's awful using the armed forces to break a strike.
02:48Well, yes, but they're trying to say,
02:50well, they're not breaking a strike.
02:51They're helping logistically to remove these 17,000 tonnes of rubbish.
02:55But to get to your first point, Damon,
02:57of course they've had to get themselves into a terrible mix.
03:01They've got to save money
03:02because Birmingham are the most bankrupt local authority in this country.
03:07They're the second biggest council in Europe,
03:11and they've gone completely bust because of mismanagement going back decades.
03:15And so they say they've got no alternative
03:17because they've got no money.
03:18They can't throw money.
03:19I tell you what,
03:20you, me, Miriam,
03:22could go into Birmingham City Council
03:23and save money,
03:25which isn't being taken away from bin operatives,
03:29bin workers, whatever.
03:31There must be so much excess money being wasted.
03:35Totally agree.
03:36So what are they actually saving with these workers?
03:39Not much, right?
03:40Eight grand a person or whatever.
03:42Yes, something like that.
03:44But because they've mishandled the finances so badly,
03:48they're now tied up in all sorts of fiscal rules
03:50where they can't go and find any more money.
03:53This dates back to an equal pay claim, doesn't it?
03:56That was brought by some female workers in a different job
03:59that claimed that they ought to have the equipment.
04:01So actually, the problem is not that the bin men earn too much.
04:04It's that if they didn't reduce the bin men's pay,
04:06they'd have to increase thousands of workers.
04:10Doesn't that show how ridiculous these equal pay claims are?
04:13Well, it does, Miriam.
04:14And if you go back to that equal pay claim,
04:16the problem was that it ended up with school dinner ladies
04:21being put on par with refuse workers.
04:25Now, anybody who's got any common sense
04:27knows that it's a much more difficult job
04:30getting up at five o'clock in the morning on a winter's day
04:32and going out and emptying bins into the back of a lorry.
04:36That's a harder job than being a dinner lady in a school.
04:40But the way they mismanaged the whole claim
04:43was that they put them on equal pegging.
04:45As a result of which,
04:47they are in debt to hundreds of millions of pounds.
04:49And getting back to Eamon's point about saving money,
04:52we all know that profligacy in local authorities is rampant.
04:58In my opinion, I'm a council taxpayer.
05:01And one thing I do really get upset about
05:03is the amount of money from my council tax bill,
05:07which goes to paying pensions
05:09for the thousands of people who work in local council,
05:13who I think if you had an investigation
05:15would be found out to be not necessary.
05:17Great.
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