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00:00:00going on beneath the day's big stories.
00:00:04stories. Now on BBC News Newscast.
00:00:10Newscast. The UK state pension is is going up and there are questions
00:00:13questions about whether the cost cost is sustainable. Lots of questions,
00:00:17questions, lots. To discuss and that's that's what we're going to do on
00:00:19on this episode of Newscast. Hello,
00:00:22Hello, it's Alex in the Newscast Newscast studio. And it's James in
00:00:26in the Glasgow Newscast studio. Faisal Faisal is here. Hey, Faisal. Hello. Hello. How you doing? I'm good, thank
00:00:30thank you. So we're going to be talking talking about pensions. Yes. And
00:00:33And we are going to be talking about about the triple lock. And the reason
00:00:36reason for this is because we had had some news on Tuesday about the
00:00:40the amount the state pension is going going to reach next year. And it's
00:00:43it's posed all of these big questions questions about affordability and
00:00:46and fairness and all the rest of of it. But before we get into it,
00:00:50it, just to set out what this is is all about, so the triple lock
00:00:54lock is a mechanism that was introduced introduced back in 2010 by the coalition coalition government, which guarantees
00:00:57guarantees that the state pension pension is going to increase every
00:01:01every year by either 2.5%. Average
00:01:05Average wages or inflation, whichever whichever is the highest. So tell
00:01:07tell us why this has become a big big thing today. So today we had
00:01:11had the average earnings figures figures for the correct time period
00:01:14period between May and July. And
00:01:17And this has been the months that
00:01:18that they choose since this began.
00:01:21began. And that came in at 3.9%.
00:01:263.9%. So that seems highly likely
00:01:29likely almost certain to be the number number that's used for the setting
00:01:33setting of the state pension via
00:01:35via the triple lock next spring.
00:01:38spring. So because it's likely to to be higher than the inflation number
00:01:41number that's reported next month month for this month, not 100% certain. certain. And there could be some
00:01:45some revisions to but basically that's that's what we're looking at now
00:01:49now 3.9%, which is a bit higher than
00:01:50than inflation, higher than 2.5%.
00:01:542.5%. And I think the best estimate estimate of the fiscal cost of this
00:01:57this over and above what's already
00:01:59already planned is about £600 million million a year, maybe a little bit
00:02:03bit more. Now that's not a vast sum.
00:02:07sum. And even though it wasn't formally formally in the baseline of the forecasts,
00:02:10forecasts, you know, it's the sort sort of sum that they'd probably
00:02:13probably expect. But I think what
00:02:15what it does do is that we have had
00:02:18had some interesting not so much much from within politics, but from
00:02:21from the axis, the very important important axis between economics
00:02:23economics and politics in particular, particular, the economists that have
00:02:27have been advising and like Jim, Jim, so sorry, just knighted him.
00:02:30him. Lord O'Neill and have been close
00:02:33close to the Prime Minister, have have raised questions that they you
00:02:37you know, they've never really liked liked the triple lock, but they've they've raised questions. So the
00:02:41the salience of the issue is there
00:02:43there about whether you do something something about this, not just if
00:02:47if you like to save money year to
00:02:49to year, but in particular to be
00:02:52be seen to be able to take on the
00:02:55the tough, unpalatable, unsolvable
00:02:58unsolvable political questions that
00:03:01that I think and I tell me if you you disagree with this, I talk to
00:03:05to economists. A lot of them thinks thinks it's totally unsustainable unsustainable and it's cost three
00:03:08three times as much as originally originally envisaged back in 2010 2010 per year, 15 billion roughly,
00:03:12roughly, rather than 5 billion. The The triple lock specifically has has triple lock specifically, rather
00:03:15rather than the state pension as as a whole. Exactly. And as a result,
00:03:18result, long-term over 3040 years years going forward demographic change
00:03:22change is still the biggest contributor contributor to the cost of the state state pension. But we're going to
00:03:26to go from 4 to 5% of the whole of of GDP for the state pension, up
00:03:30up to more like 9% and 1 to 2 percentage
00:03:33percentage points of GDP would be be the triple lock if that continued.
00:03:37continued. And you're going to say say to me that's ridiculous. It's It's not going to last 30, 40 years.
00:03:40years. But then you ask yourself yourself the question like, where
00:03:43where is the logical political stop
00:03:47stop to this, given that this is is what I was going to go on to say, say, you have the economists sort
00:03:51sort of in unison saying this is is unsustainable and frankly, ports
00:03:53ports when they're talking privately, privately, you have plenty of politicians politicians that say the same thing.
00:03:57thing. And then when you turn the the cameras on, they say something something completely different. Yeah.
00:03:59Yeah. And I bet Alex, I'd love to to hear your take on that. You know,
00:04:02know, you talk to a lot more politicians politicians than private than I do,
00:04:06do, but I wonder if the answer to to your question, Faisal, isn't a
00:04:10a little bit of what will what where
00:04:13where is the stop politically is
00:04:15is when younger people demonstrate
00:04:18demonstrate and however they demonstrate demonstrate that by maybe voting
00:04:21voting in larger numbers than they they have traditionally done so,
00:04:23so, or maybe by taking to the streets streets and protesting about it or
00:04:27or in some other way start to say,
00:04:29say, wait a minute, we are getting. getting. It's a cake, isn't it? Everything's
00:04:33Everything's it's just one big cake cake to really simplify your job.
00:04:36job. I'm sure your job Faisal's a a bit more simple than. It's just
00:04:39just one big cake and yours, Alex. Alex. But you know, OK, it's a big
00:04:43big pizza and younger people are are getting less of the pizza and
00:04:46and older people are getting more more of the pizza as years go. Go
00:04:49Go on. But Alex, to come back to to that point. What? Sorry, I should
00:04:53should have just shut up and let let you say it in the first place.
00:04:55place. What's your take on whether whether any of that, if that's indeed
00:04:59indeed either of you, accept that that as an argument and if so, like
00:05:02like do politicians privately accept accept any of that as well? Well, Well, I think the reason that you
00:05:06you could call this today a sort sort of renewed debate about the
00:05:09the triple lock is because quietly, quietly, yeah, there has been debate debate about how affordable the triple
00:05:13triple lock is in the long-term. long-term. But there is in this a
00:05:16a kind of economics question that that Faisal, you've outlined and
00:05:20and a political one. And politically politically speaking, we're still
00:05:22still in a position where publicly publicly every major political party
00:05:26party to the big Westminster parties, parties, to the Liberal Democrats, Democrats, the Conservatives, Labour
00:05:29Labour and Reform UK who did at some some point flirt actually Nigel Farage
00:05:32Farage with the idea of maybe looking looking again at the triple lock.
00:05:35lock. They're now saying they are are committed to keeping the triple
00:05:39triple lock quietly. There are some some who suggest that this might
00:05:42might need to be looked at at some some point, and you've had some publicly
00:05:45publicly come out. So people like like Michael Gove, conservative peer, peer, now saying that perhaps we
00:05:48we need to have a look at the triple triple lock. David Willetts, who
00:05:51who is the head of the Resolution Resolution Foundation, which is a a think tank for low and middle income
00:05:55income families saying doesn't think think that the triple lock is sustainable. sustainable. You know, Jim O'Neill,
00:05:59O'Neill, as you mentioned, Faisal, Faisal, who was advising Andy Burnham, Burnham, economists saying doesn't
00:06:03doesn't think the triple lock is is necessarily affordable or sustainable. sustainable. Those people haven't
00:06:07haven't got a rely on votes, have have they? In the same way that kind
00:06:10kind of frontline politicians, MPs MPs and leaders of political parties parties have. And I think there is
00:06:13is just a real consciousness that. that. Yeah, I mean, the kind of basic
00:06:16basic way of looking at this is older
00:06:19older people vote and therefore politicians politicians don't want to do something something that's going to wind up
00:06:23up a lot of older people. But when when you speak to. Me basic. You're
00:06:26You're calling me basic. I'm sorry, sorry, but you know, that's the kind
00:06:29kind of like assumed reason that that frontline politicians or parties
00:06:32parties my basic take. And now, Alex, Alex, you're going to give us a nuanced
00:06:35nuanced take. Well, I. Think when when you do speak to politicians politicians about this, there are
00:06:38are some that say actually, look,
00:06:40look, it's there are still a lot lot of pensioners who don't have
00:06:44have a lot of money and that pensioner pensioner poverty is still a real real thing. And that if you just
00:06:47just take the basic state pension, pension, if we're looking at what
00:06:51what it might go up to next year
00:06:52year under this new figures, it's
00:06:55it's about £13,000. So if you do do have pensioners relying on that
00:06:58that state pension, that isn't a a huge amount of money. So to do
00:07:01do something that might see it increase increase by less or not keep pace
00:07:04pace with the cost of living or how how much people are earning, that that could be really problematic
00:07:07problematic for pensioners on low low incomes. And if you look at something
00:07:10something like means testing, that that can become quite complicated.
00:07:13complicated. And the other political political argument against this that that you hear frequently is that
00:07:17that it's wrong to frame this as as a sort of generational warfare
00:07:21warfare between the younger generation generation versus the older generation,
00:07:23generation, and that it has to be be either or. Now counter to all
00:07:27all of that is the fact that there's there's a very active political debate
00:07:29debate about welfare right now. And
00:07:31And the exactly as you say, pensions
00:07:34pensions is a massive chunk of the the overall spend on welfare. And
00:07:38And yet all of the political debate
00:07:40debate about welfare is focused largely
00:07:42largely on working age welfare and and particularly health and disability
00:07:46disability benefits. And what can can or should we do about that? And And that is where some people might
00:07:50might say, is that really fair, that that the conversation politically,
00:07:53politically, openly seems to be focused
00:07:55focused on that without so much acknowledgement acknowledgement about do we need
00:07:58need to have a look at pensions in in the triple lock in particular?
00:08:02particular? So so I think that another another sort of angle on this and
00:08:06and what Lord O'Neill had said more more than just not liking the policy,
00:08:09policy, which he clearly, clearly clearly doesn't. And it's a very
00:08:12very good point there about the unpredictability
00:08:16unpredictability of it. Like whatever whatever you think, if you think think like we should devote more
00:08:19more resources to pensioners, you you probably want to do so in a more more structured way. That's predictable.
00:08:23predictable. That's not just dependent dependent one year on earnings, one one year on inflation because that
00:08:26that is quite distortionary. But
00:08:28But that is what has happened. But But Lord O'Neill specific argument
00:08:32argument went a little bit deeper deeper and is quite interesting,
00:08:34interesting, which is at a time where
00:08:37where markets are asking all governments governments around the world about
00:08:40about the levels of borrowing. Essentially Essentially that's what's happened.
00:08:42happened. The interest those interest interest rates are going up. And
00:08:46And one of the question marks lingering
00:08:48lingering about the UK actually are
00:08:51are borrowing numbers are going down
00:08:54down as fast as anyone else in the the major economies. But there may
00:08:58may be a perception about the UK UK as being incapable of dealing
00:09:01dealing with long-term structural
00:09:05structural issues. Things that are are not don't seem very sustainable,
00:09:07sustainable, not even able to have have a conversation about it. So
00:09:10So I think you're absolutely right right to point out that in this Parliament
00:09:14Parliament things are covered by by manifesto commitments, which is
00:09:17is why when we get politicians in in front of us, as I did with the
00:09:20the Chancellor last week, you sort sort of say, you know, can you even
00:09:23even you know, I was trying to sort sort of channel what Lord O'Neill O'Neill was saying. Can you even
00:09:26even have a conversation about what what this might be in a couple of of years' time? And if you were to
00:09:30to have a conversation that was different different for the set of manifestos manifestos for the whenever the next
00:09:34next general election is, you would would probably start having the conversation conversation now you'd be getting
00:09:37getting the OBR, the IFS or clever
00:09:39clever people, Beancounters and whomever whomever and representatives of pension
00:09:43pension organisations and young people's people's organisations. And you say, say, listen, how are we going to
00:09:46to divvy this up? Does it in some some way relate to our settlement
00:09:50settlement with social care? You
00:09:51You know, an overall sense of fairness
00:09:55fairness because what Lord O'Neill O'Neill was essentially saying was
00:09:58was as much as the pennies and pounds
00:10:00pounds you could save with still, still, it's just a slightly less
00:10:04less generous increase. It is the
00:10:07the directional steer you give to
00:10:10to everybody that a government in
00:10:12in the UK can have difficult conversations. conversations. Like credibility,
00:10:15credibility, right? Even with its
00:10:17its own constituencies. And it can
00:10:19can and it can deal with those issues issues and it can handle handle some
00:10:23some flak, but it can make arguments. arguments. You know, I think that
00:10:26that that is what Lord O'Neill was was talking about when he called called it a golden opportunity. And
00:10:29And to be clear, he was talking about about both the well, the conventional
00:10:33conventional working age welfare welfare bill and pensions. But listen,
00:10:37listen, I've just come back from
00:10:40from delightful exercise class at at the Southwark, just filming for for the six and ten o'clock news.
00:10:44news. I literally thought you meant meant you'd been. That's been your. your. No, no, that's highly unrealistic.
00:10:47unrealistic. Come on. No no. No but
00:10:51but like I was filming our sequence sequence for the six and ten o'clock
00:10:54o'clock news and you do find that that the generational war is overdone.
00:10:57overdone. You lots of pensioners pensioners are like, I really worry
00:11:00worry about the young'uns, but actually actually 13 grand's not enough. And
00:11:03And when you then vox pop young people, people, they are like, oh, we've
00:11:06we've got to look after pensioners. pensioners. And of course, the great great irony about this is the timing.
00:11:10timing. The younger people that are are campaigning against it. I think think what you can guarantee is,
00:11:14is, is that it may last until they they become pensioners, and then
00:11:17then they'll find out that they have have campaigned for their own pensions
00:11:19pensions to be smaller. So just out out of interest, Faisal, I suppose
00:11:23suppose I always like to think, well, well, if you take a step back and
00:11:26and you start from the principle principle of why is why does the
00:11:29the state do this? You know, what what is the role of the state? To
00:11:33To what extent is it the state's
00:11:36state's job to pool the collective
00:11:39collective wealth to a certain degree degree of the nation and then provide
00:11:41provide a certain degree of it to to people in retirement to do other
00:11:45other countries do that the same same way? Are other countries perhaps
00:11:48perhaps have systems that are more more tied to average earnings over
00:11:51over someone's lifetime and or rather rather than a state pension. Can
00:11:54Can you what's your sense of where where we sit compared to how other
00:11:58other nations do this and how other other nations look after people when
00:12:01when they get to retirement age or or don't? Yeah. The general we don't
00:12:05don't have a wildly generous state state pension and the triple lock
00:12:07lock as a policy over a decade and
00:12:10and a half has brought it up to sort
00:12:13sort of, you know, to, to, to levels
00:12:15levels that compare with similar
00:12:18similar countries in, in Europe,
00:12:22Europe, but I, you know, it's a natural natural role of any government to
00:12:24to pull these sorts of risks over
00:12:26over time. And I think the brutal brutal reality about this is that
00:12:30that there are lots and lots of young
00:12:34young people who are not saving enough
00:12:36enough for their pensions, who are are going to be significantly reliant
00:12:39reliant on whatever the state pension, pension, whatever remains of the
00:12:42the state pension in 20, 30, 40 years'
00:12:45years' time. You know, so there are are a number but you know, but this
00:12:49this story or the story of what the the current state pension is, is
00:12:52is very much seen through the lens
00:12:53lens of it's a fixed amount of money, money, pretty much it rises with
00:12:57with some form of inflation. We have
00:13:00have had very high levels of inflation. inflation. So this is accounted for
00:13:04for that. And certainly when you you talk to anybody and of course
00:13:07course we have to recognise that that you know it is paid out. But
00:13:11But you know some people obviously obviously have extra pensions on
00:13:13on top of that and they pay tax on on that. And that's a separate issue.
00:13:16issue. But you know, when it's paid paid out it's it people have do not
00:13:20not feel like it's covered the increase increase in prices that has hit them
00:13:23them over the past 3 or 4 years. years. I'll just put it like that. that. You mentioned taxes worth saying
00:13:27saying actually, because if the state state pension does rise to above above £13,000, which it's expected
00:13:31expected to from next year, that
00:13:32that would mean that in theory on
00:13:35on paper then it could become eligible eligible for income tax because the
00:13:39the personal allowance, at which which point you start paying income income tax is below £13,000. But
00:13:43But we have had some clarity from from the government on Tuesday, and
00:13:46and they suggested that people who who just rely on the state pension
00:13:49pension and if it's just over £13,000, £13,000, they're going to find a a mechanism at the budget to make
00:13:53make sure that those people aren't aren't dragged into paying income
00:13:57income tax on the basic state pension, pension, although we don't really really know. There was a little bit
00:14:00bit of that. Around this today, wasn't wasn't there? Yeah, there. Was the the Business Secretary, Jonathan
00:14:04Jonathan Reynolds sort of didn't didn't confirm that when he was doing doing what's called the morning round.
00:14:07round. You know, the interviews on on BBC Breakfast, he just said that's that's going to be a decision for
00:14:12for the budget. But then we got a a bit of clarity, I think later from
00:14:14from Torsten Bell, who is the pensions pensions minister, who did say there's there's going to be in something
00:14:18something the budget to make sure sure there's something going on just
00:14:20just above that. I well, well, the
00:14:22the what people may may be not thinking
00:14:24thinking maybe they're going to mess mess around with the threshold generally.
00:14:27generally. I wondered that. So that's that's the other obvious. That's That's why you've got some slightly
00:14:31slightly nervous. Answers around around it. Maybe they wait for the the budget and then increase the
00:14:35the threshold. So it is sitting at at that. But and just to be clear, clear, just to be totally clear,
00:14:39clear, when we say they would pay pay tax on it, they wouldn't pay pay tax on all of it. They'd only
00:14:43only pay tax on the bit that was was above the threshold. Right. Yeah.
00:14:45Yeah. Yeah. Just to be the threshold threshold to be 12,750. And this
00:14:49this is interesting because the triple triple lock is at this point no longer
00:14:51longer a triple lock. It's possibly possibly certainly it's a triple
00:14:54triple lock plus you could call it it quadruple lock because you've you've got the three things you talked
00:14:58talked about. And now it's like and
00:15:00and you will not have to pay tax tax on it if it's your own income,
00:15:04income, which is actually there would would be an argument for saying if if you don't want to change a triple
00:15:08triple lock, one way to sort of just
00:15:11just sort of level off the cost of of it is to let it kind of go into
00:15:15into the tax system and get back back some of the money that way so
00:15:18so that you could have that as a a strategy. That is a choice. If
00:15:21If you were trying to sort of level level off the cost of it. This is
00:15:25is all predicated on the notion that that we're not all going to die and
00:15:28and some sort of AI catastrophe, catastrophe, which Alex and I have
00:15:31have been talking about on Newscast Newscast this week as being something something that's significantly preoccupying
00:15:35preoccupying us. So we shall we say, say, Alex. Yeah, without a shadow
00:15:38shadow of a doubt. We were talking, talking, weren't we, on the pod earlier earlier about Darius Amadi, who is
00:15:42is the head of Anthropic, who was was kind of backing this call for
00:15:45for more regulation and all the rest rest of it. Faisal, you've been talking
00:15:49talking to another co-founder of of Anthropic. I think we can actually
00:15:52actually hear a little bit of what what he had to say. This is Jack
00:15:55Jack Clark. I think most most labs labs have different ways of being
00:15:58being able to pull the plug. And And yes, of course we have systems systems in place for this, but this
00:16:02this is the kind of thing that you you want to feed into the larger
00:16:06larger policy conversation. Should Should you mandate that companies companies definitely have a kill
00:16:09kill switch? And is that kill switch switch verifiable by a third party?
00:16:12party? I think that's the kind of
00:16:16of thing that society is going to to want to know and might want to to eventually pass rules around.
00:16:19around. But it may already be too too late. It's not too late. And
00:16:22And I don't believe that we're yet
00:16:24yet at this maximal kind of danger danger zone. But we are close enough
00:16:27enough that we need to be taking taking this seriously and having
00:16:31having national level public conversations conversations about it. So he's talking talking about a kill switch, something
00:16:35something that can just shut it off off completely. His tone though, though, I mean, what did you make
00:16:39make of it? Did he seem to you to to validate some of the other warnings
00:16:42warnings that we've heard from across across the industry? It's a very very interesting. So he's the boss
00:16:46boss of some of the whistleblowers whistleblowers and other. And the
00:16:49the other people that have made these these warnings of 10% chance or more
00:16:52more of human extinction. And he he didn't buy into that specific specific number. So it's quite typical
00:16:56typical of these sorts of labs. You You have all sorts of different opinions,
00:16:59opinions, but he's the guy that runs
00:17:01runs that whole sort of safety of
00:17:04of AI for Anthropic, which for those
00:17:05those that don't know is up there there possibly more successful than
00:17:09than OpenAI right now. It's kind
00:17:12kind of and potentially worth up up to $2 trillion if it if it floats,
00:17:16floats, it runs. Claude. Now, I he
00:17:19he didn't buy into the 10% number, number, but in a way, if you listen
00:17:23listen carefully to what he did say
00:17:25say was happening. And the takeaway
00:17:27takeaway is about as you've been
00:17:30been discussing is about an AI that
00:17:34that is probably cleverer than us
00:17:36us right now, just about a human
00:17:39human being and is on course to be
00:17:42be quite quickly, exponentially cleverer. cleverer. Definitely like a dozens
00:17:45dozens of times 100 times cleverer.
00:17:48cleverer. And the ability of humankind humankind to control that. Now he
00:17:52he runs, he helps run that lab and
00:17:54and that is what he's saying. And And you know, at this point we have
00:17:58have to express some humility as as journalists. You know, when I'm
00:18:01I'm covering complicated derivatives derivatives in the financial markets markets to, you know, there's only
00:18:05only a certain you know, we have have to ask questions and we have
00:18:08have to rely even on the people we're we're interviewing at the companies,
00:18:12companies, understanding the world world that they're describing. And
00:18:15And all I can say is I did interview interview him four months ago and and interview him now. And I was
00:18:19was let I left the room talking to
00:18:21to him, thinking that they have seen
00:18:25seen developments over the past 3 3 or 4 months that they are genuinely genuinely concerned and worried about.
00:18:29about. And yes, there are other motives motives and rationales and reasons
00:18:32reasons and things to question him him about, you know, rising from from your conversations that I questioned
00:18:36questioned him about. And people people should make their own judgement.
00:18:39judgement. But yeah, they are serious
00:18:42serious about there being a small
00:18:45small window of opportunity. Whilst
00:18:48Whilst this can be controlled. Of
00:18:52Of action, which then raises the the question which I repeatedly put put to him which is like well hang
00:18:56hang on, you just sort of jazz hands. hands. This is not you know, please
00:18:59please stop us. Please stop us. We We can't help ourselves. But like,
00:19:02like, well, you can stop yourself. yourself. And there's a number of
00:19:06of quite amusing analogies in the the interview where he says, well, well, if a plane wasn't safe and
00:19:09and then you'd do this. And I said, said, well, you wouldn't take the the plane. Was this dangerous? You
00:19:12You wouldn't get on it. Well, you you wouldn't fly it. You wouldn't
00:19:15wouldn't make it. Maybe, you know,
00:19:17know, so but yeah. What what is the
00:19:22the response though to and some newscasters newscasters may be. Listening thinking
00:19:25thinking this and you've alluded alluded to it there that wait a minute.
00:19:28minute. These people stand to make make huge sums of money that some
00:19:32some of these big companies are about about to float on the Stock Exchange Exchange or are preparing to float
00:19:35float on the Stock Exchange or thinking thinking about raising money. It's
00:19:39It's absolutely in their interest interest to talk up their power and
00:19:43and potency and threat. And, you you know, some people might say,
00:19:45say, well, you know, we've had tech tech companies talking about this this before. Look at the millennium
00:19:49millennium bug, which was apparently apparently end the world. And then then actually nothing happened at
00:19:52at all. And it's all froth like what? what? You know, that's the counter,
00:19:55counter, isn't it? That is the other other side of the argument. And sorry,
00:19:58sorry, in terms of what I meant to to add to that is and actually all
00:20:02all of this ripples out into the the markets and it has been having having an effect on the markets.
00:20:05markets. It has it's damping down
00:20:06down the markets a bit. And I think
00:20:10think ultimately I think the logic
00:20:12logic of that argument, it does mean mean that you would stress how powerful
00:20:16powerful your models are and then then how your models were the only
00:20:19only sort of, you know, potential
00:20:21potential medicine for this ailment.
00:20:25ailment. But so frightening are some
00:20:27some of the sort of forecasts as as to what might happen that they're
00:20:31they're inviting much bigger kind kind of intervention. You know, people
00:20:34people will contemplate quasi nationalisation, nationalisation, seizing the companies
00:20:38companies potentially on the basis basis of these sorts of threats. threats. I mean, if you think about
00:20:41about some new form of energy that
00:20:43that could solve our problems, hooray!
00:20:46hooray! But like kill the whole of
00:20:48of humanity at a at some sort of of fractional percentage of it, you
00:20:52you know, I'm not sure that would would get anywhere, right. I'm not
00:20:54not sure people would. Yeah. So I
00:20:58I like I like I feel they're so specific
00:21:00specific about some of the challenges
00:21:03challenges and they're inviting active
00:21:05active action from around the globe. globe. Asking for regulation, asking
00:21:08asking for to step in. But like where
00:21:11where I do have some where I am intrigued intrigued in, I don't think it's
00:21:15it's straightforwardly like they're they're trying to boost their value
00:21:18value ahead of an IPO. In many ways ways it might be easier ahead of
00:21:21of a flotation to be slightly less
00:21:24less apocalyptic, where I have some some where I'm intrigued and you you can see in the interview it's
00:21:28it's on the iPlayer, it's on YouTube YouTube where I was intrigued by
00:21:32by the answer. I'll just put it like like that was when I said, well, well, hang on, the real challenge
00:21:36challenge for you with these Chinese Chinese models that are coming out
00:21:39out that are essentially very, very
00:21:41very cheap and they're 90% as effective
00:21:45effective and I thought his answer answer to that was quite intriguing. intriguing. He said that they were
00:21:48were a year behind, but like they they are facing competition. And
00:21:52And the question is there's a if if you take a step back, there's there's a big model here which is
00:21:55is the US is chucking money via the the stock market via the capital
00:21:59capital markets at being the absolute absolute cutting edge frontier of
00:22:02of AI, the best AI in the world. world. Whereas the Chinese are sort
00:22:06sort of trying to create quite a
00:22:07a cheap, effective AI. That's that
00:22:10that is usable for most use cases.
00:22:13cases. And I do still I've said it it before on Newscast, it is astonishing
00:22:16astonishing to think that many US
00:22:20US multinationals are basing some some of their AI on these Chinese
00:22:23Chinese derived models, which is is what's happening. So interesting.
00:22:25interesting. And yes, listen to Faisal's Faisal's full interview with Jack Jack Clark on BBC iPlayer. Faisal,
00:22:29Faisal, thank you so much. Thank Thank you. Well, that's all from
00:22:33from this episode right here. But But we did record a bit more. And
00:22:37And if you want to hear that, you you should go to BBC Sounds where
00:22:40where you can also subscribe to newscasts. newscasts. But that's it from me
00:22:42me and
00:24:43truth, trust and fake news on BBC
00:24:45BBC News. There is nothing like driving
00:24:53driving into a moving story and not not knowing what is going to happen
00:24:56happen when we enter Damascus. It It was full of rebels shooting in
00:24:59in the air in celebration. You can can hear the sound of celebratory
00:25:02celebratory gunfire. Nobody knew knew what was going to happen. And
00:25:05And I live for those moments. These These troops are heading into the
00:25:07the battle zone in Khartoum, says says the army to carry out a special
00:25:11special operation. Entering Khartoum Khartoum after the Sudanese army
00:25:14army recaptured it was a seminal seminal moment. The level of destruction
00:25:17destruction was stunning. It was was the largest market in Sudan.
00:25:20Sudan. But you can see the level level of destruction now. When things
00:25:23things become volatile and unpredictable, unpredictable, it's crucial to stay
00:25:27stay focused. There's a standoff
00:25:30standoff between police and protesters protesters here after another police
00:25:33police shooting of a black man in in Minnesota. Sometimes meeting someone
00:25:36someone on the ground can change change how you understand a story.
00:25:39story. I'm thinking of a number of of women that I met in Sudan talking
00:25:43talking about the hardships they
00:25:45they experienced. Covering these
00:25:49these stories over the years has has impressed upon me how resilient
00:25:52resilient people are. And yes, many many of them are desperate and exhausted,
00:25:55exhausted, but many of them are also also steadfast. They're gracious
00:25:59gracious and they're generous. Journalism Journalism is about being there.
00:26:02there. As events unfold and telling telling people not only what happened
00:26:05happened but why it matters and what
00:26:07what it means. History happens in
00:26:10in real time and someone needs to
00:26:12to be there to witness it. Thwaites
00:26:21Thwaites Glacier It's an incredibly incredibly alluring and attractive
00:26:23attractive place to go. I was really
00:26:25really excited to visit because every every coastline in the world will
00:26:28will be changed by what happens in in that part of Antarctica, so it's
00:26:32it's all the more important that that we get there with our cameras cameras and show people the changes
00:26:36changes that are taking place. So So we've been filming out here for
00:26:39for an hour and a half and this is
00:26:42is the result. And it gives you an an idea of why it's so hard to operate
00:26:46operate here. But there's also a a story about getting to where we're
00:26:49we're going. It took us five weeks weeks to get to the front of the the glacier. Only four people had
00:26:53had ever been there before. It has has taken years of preparation to
00:26:56to get the scientists out here, and and because of all the delays. What
00:26:59What I didn't expect was to be camping camping on ice for five weeks. It's
00:27:03It's shocking. And you know, we should should all be upset by what what's
00:27:07what's happening here? This is a a really important story. This is is something people need to know.
00:27:10know. But again, if we can understand
00:27:12understand it, we can do something
00:27:15something about it. One thing I can
00:27:21can say which is true of this region region is that it's become harder
00:27:24harder to be a journalist. It's really
00:27:27really important to be on the ground ground if that means you've got to
00:27:31to go to hostile remote places, then
00:27:33then we have to do that. That's the the opium resin is a very pungent
00:27:37pungent smell of it in the air right
00:27:38right now. The delta wave of Covid
00:27:41Covid devastated India, and I think think it was the coverage that we
00:27:44we did for the BBC at the time which
00:27:48which brought international attention attention to what's happening here
00:27:50here could affect the world's ability ability to recover from the pandemic.
00:27:54pandemic. We've met with families families who've had to do the unthinkable.
00:27:57unthinkable. Another person came came up and asked if we'd like to
00:28:00to buy their child. The desperation
00:28:02desperation is hard to put in words. words. Many of the stories we've
00:28:05we've had to tell are distressing. distressing. They're difficult, but
00:28:09but that's usually an indicator that
00:28:11that they're really important stories
00:28:14stories to tell.
00:29:03MUSIC
00:30:10Live from Washington. This is
00:30:12BBC News. The UN issues a warning
00:30:15warning about the humanitarian crisis crisis in Yemen as the Houthis and
00:30:18and Saudi forces exchange large-scale large-scale drone and missile attacks,
00:30:22attacks, forcing more than 100,000 100,000 people from their homes.
00:30:26homes. The Pentagon says US Space Space Force has positioned weapons
00:30:30weapons in Earth's orbit that are are capable of destroying hostile
00:30:33hostile threats. An AI leaders gather
00:30:36gather at summits on both sides of of the country as President Trump
00:30:39Trump continues to downplay growing
00:30:42growing concerns about the technology.
00:30:53technology. I'm Helena Humphrey good good to have you with us. We begin begin in the Middle East, where the
00:30:57the UN is warning that the humanitarian humanitarian crisis in Yemen