00:00I think it's time to unveil Helen as a gigantic nerd because she has needs no unveiling but yes
00:06people who are listening not watching she has come in with her ring binder she's got her
00:10highlighter pen she's got her sticky notes she's got her tinfoil hat like she's got the she's got
00:17everything here and frankly if you want to know how the sausage is made she's about to tell you
00:22because it's kind of extraordinary and is it fair to say that this sausage involves quite a lot of
00:28matter and sawdust and not actual meat there's quite a lot of sawdust I would say so yes
00:33unfortunately you know here we are in my happy place with a lot of stationery and flagging and
00:39it's so the first thing to say is that when it's described as this is the first
00:43tranche of documents that's released I mean it sounds really kind of formal and impressive like
00:48there's some system where the documents have been all summoned and then they're going to be released
00:53in these set tranches I mean this thing is entirely made up uh folks Helen but it sounds so transparent
01:00and reassuring it's not clear because basically you've what you've done is what should have
01:06happened is five weeks ago when the humble address comes in you kind of do a big scope like what
01:10is
01:10the information that is within a scope and then let's gather all the information and then let's work
01:16out what can't we release what can we release and then why we need to release it in different ways
01:21and
01:21as we've already explained the met police is also has a quite important walk-on role here to say no
01:26you can't do this or yes you can't do the other the really amazing thing about the hundred and well
01:32so there's 137 pages numbered pages of documents of actual content there's 147 pages that were kind of
01:40published together because there's 10 pages of kind of contents and intro and that tells you something
01:46about just how much padding there is in this document released from yesterday so I counted wait
01:52for it because obviously I have a post-it people uh so there's 28 actual blank pages actual blank pages
01:58there's 17 pages which are kind of should have something written on them where there's a space
02:04for writing to be and there is none uh there are 30 pages of standard hr guidance just like copy
02:10and
02:11paste uh hr guidance 19 pages of appointment uh appointment to a new job guidance which is just
02:17kind of stuck in here so the notion terms and conditions the notion that this is some kind of
02:23really juicy uh set of the actual decisions the actual conversations that happened and the actual
02:29information involved I mean it's just not it's there are some things and we're going to go on to talk
02:34about them but there is very very little here there's an enormous amount of padding well where I'd love to
02:39start gosh that is a lot of padding where I'd like to start is just how the government does release
02:45information generally so I do recall this was a key part of your job when we were in government
02:51is looking at files before they are released to the public um and you can get into the different
02:58ones and I do remember a couple of occasions where you'd have to quickly recall something because
03:01something that shouldn't have come out had done one of the weird things about this it's one yes you're
03:06right it's one one of my one of my teams had to do some fact there's quite a lot of
03:09my old teams
03:10scattered through this uh or at least in uh what they are now scattered through this document so
03:14one of the oddities of yesterday is that in and amongst the papers some prem papers were released so
03:20those are the papers which are really historic to do with when Tony Blair was prime minister
03:24the humble address doesn't in fact call for the release of these papers but again slightly to the
03:30filler point of like you put in some papers you didn't really need to and then also you've dragged
03:36Tony Blair into this conversation I think there's some interesting choices and I think that's the main
03:41the kind of main point I want to make is these are choices so it might look like it's just
03:46kind of
03:47happening mysteriously by magic in a very proper way actually somebody brackets who is choosing
03:53what is released to the public in what form so there's a very good and clear explanation about what's
03:59redacted but there is so much that is not in these papers that I've got some questions about that like
04:05what what are we not hearing where are the whatsapp messages how can there be no conversations at all
04:10happening on whatsapp we know that there are we know that's how people speak to each other
04:15but there's literally zero yes and actually there's a story out this morning Thursday in Politico which
04:21is saying that um there are various people who are who have been asked to provide their messages and
04:27they're still waiting to follow up and they don't know if it's direct messages with Peter Mandelson
04:30whether it's groups because we know a thing or two about whatsapp groups being published I'm afraid to say
04:36um a very a quick note on what prem papers are these are the prime minister's uh kind of diaries
04:42and
04:43and let's say personal meetings it's a record of the prime minister so so interesting enough and one of the
04:49things I think we will get to is that the one person who's really missing the one voice you don't
04:55hear
04:55at all in any of these conversations about the appointment of the ambassador is the prime minister
05:01himself so if you look at the papers from Tony Blair's era you can see Tony Blair's writing on it's
05:06pretty normal here's here's a piece of advice prime minister goes in the box printed out here's the
05:11prime minister's handwriting back saying yes no what about this whatever and you can see those in the Tony
05:15Blair papers we have in this uh in this kind of dossier tranche whatever whatever we're calling it
05:21we've got a box note or two to the prime minister and nothing back so there's no there's just no
05:28way
05:28he would not have responded I just don't I mean that of the many things I don't understand I don't
05:33understand the kind of having the box note in and not the response back yeah the response back is
05:39really and and to be super nerdy I'm just going to own my nerdiness that that really matters because
05:44the point of record keeping in government is exactly it's not for these not always for purposes
05:49as grim as this but it is to be able to see written down and recorded and properly captured
05:55how a decision was made who was involved in that decision and the kind of rationale for it because
06:00that's useful for all sorts of reasons it's not just about appointments that's like why did we decide
06:04to do this particular thing why did we decide to spend this money here why did we decide that this
06:08person was our ally and this person was our enemy all of that stuff needs the rationale really matters and
06:13there is just there is so much that's just not here yeah and actually in episode two when we talked
06:19about the the humble address and the manderson files back in february we said how the whole thing does
06:26come down to the prime minister's judgment and what is released will show us what he thought and how he
06:31felt about it and you're absolutely right we are none the wiser on his judgment on this stuff and things
06:37like not responding to a box note either for some reason that isn't being shown to us very problematic
06:44or he's just not doing his box work very problematic
06:48you
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