The News Quiz: Ep6. Peace Deals and Police Powers

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Parlé vous français.

Hui?

Et vous comond vous englais.

Free pour le le next week, bien, vous ave vous, a new job,

vousette, le prime minister de la France.

Fairly situation, and pour all others, if sur PBC radiocatre, c'est le quise tenouvelle, avec Andy Zoltsom.

Sorry, you can turn the subtitles function on your radio off now.

Welcome to the news quiz.

I'm Andy Zoltzoman.

Let's get straight into the because we're going to start with a question about the Middle East peace deal.

And I want to get it done and dusted quickly just in case the eternity it's slated to last for isn't quite as eternal as everyone hopes.

So we have our teams this week.

We have Team Everlasting Peace versus Team Let's Just Aim for a week to start with and then take it from there, shall we?

On Team Everlasting, we have Scott Bennett and Aisha Hazarika.

And on Team One Week, Ian Smith and Kate Checker.

So our first question can go to Scott and Aisha.

Strong, durable and everlasting.

A catchy advertising slogan for sure, but it's describing what exciting new product being promoted this week.

Is it my online dating profile?

Is it new hosiery?

New hosiery.

Those two could be linked, I guess, in some way.

Any other suggestions?

Strong, durable, and everlasting?

It's the start of the peace deal.

Correct.

It's quite interesting, really, because I think it's interesting he's a middleman.

Trump's a middleman, because I think he's quite good at a negotiating thing, really.

Because I think it they might not agree on a lot of things, those two sides, but I think the fact that they both think he might be a bit of a tit

has given him some starting ground, you know.

And I think they'll be quite keen to push through that peace deal because he's threatened to pop over.

He said it in a way that my mum and dad do when they're dropping a cottage pie round.

Just going to pop in and check on the peace deal.

And I think if I had that clown in my spare room, I'd sign any form.

So he might have played a blinder, you know?

It's one of those kind of weird things because there's lots of sort of people on the liberal side of politics who can't stand Trump.

But of course, you know, if he does bring this war to an end, then that is a good thing.

And everyone's kind of thinking, how did he make this happen?

And it is basically because he is the maddest person in the room whenever it comes to any negotiating.

And now everyone's like, how did he?

I actually think the Qataris played a blinder on this because they gave him a free plane, and then Israel bombed Qatar, then he massively fell out with Netanyahu.

So, the kind of message of this is: bribes massively work.

Bribe early, bribe big, and bribe often.

Yeah, well, I think I could have got this done quicker.

Okay, right.

So,

what I would do with any sort of peace deal is I would have like 20 boxes, and like on one end of the boxes, you'd have Palestinian statehood, and on the other end, you'd have that Israel occupy Palestine forever.

And you would slowly pick boxes and take some of those away, and then a banker would call you

and sort of make an offer.

Peace deal or no peace deal.

I feel like Trump caused a lot of this mess.

It feels like Vohero Syndrome.

Like, he caused the trouble, and then he's like, now, look, watch, I'm cleaning it up.

You know, like when you have one of those boyfriends that like cooks dinner and he's like, and now I'm doing the washing up.

it's like, yeah, that's your job.

You made this mess.

We're in it.

I'm annoyed we have to like dangle prizes in front of this giant baby of a kid

to like have a decent way to live in the world.

But I mean, does that not, you know, if the prize dangling works, and clearly he's still sitting by his phone waiting to hear if the Nobel Committee

award him the big gong, do we not just need more

prizes?

Get like some sort of Nobel prize for not invading the city of Chicago, for example.

Yeah.

Maybe he could have loads of prizes on a conveyor belt going in front of him.

And he gets to keep all the prizes he remembers.

But listen, I mean, if he manages to get peace, and if this peace deal does hold, then I say give him all the prizes.

He can have everything.

He can have a Grammy, he can have an Oscar, he can have Miss World, not literally, obviously, but like

I would love to see Trump win a Mobo.

Acceptance speech will be incredible.

This is maybe

too serious for my usual vibe, so maybe I'll just do a sort of armpit far after it.

But I was reading that apparently, historically, Israeli wars end when the US is like super firm with Israel.

So you could say, give them the Nobel Peace Prize, or you could say, well, if you'd been firmer earlier rather than supplying them with weapons, maybe there'd be less dead people.

I'm quite good at these.

Who said satire is dead?

I mean, it's quite a sort of change of tone for Trump from just a few months ago when he was retweeting AI videos of him dancing in a Gaza that had had all the population ethnically cleansed and been turned into a luxury holiday resort.

But I mean, is this now the blueprint for how we achieve I mean, it's not a very good one is it like you're allowed to do two years of war until someone decides that they might get a prize out of it maybe that's just the way we are in the world now everyone needs little rewards for everything i mean i think it started at school when your kid was getting a certificate for finishing their lunch

yes peace could be on the verge of breaking out after an agreement between israel and hamas uh over gaza u.s boss donald trump has rode back on his previous dream of gaza becoming a holiday resort in favor of a more prosaic goal of becoming somewhere where people can just safely live in their own homes, which is probably not quite as exciting for him.

He announced that all the hostages would be released soon and that Israel would withdraw troops to an agreed line in the first phase of the deal.

As we record, Trump is sitting expectantly by the phone waiting for the call from the Nobel Peace Prize Committee.

Now, look, I'm not on the Nobel Committee yet, and I'm not going to tell them how to do their job, but to me, it might be worth just waiting to see if the peace deal works.

I mean, if Trump gets it this week, that would be like someone getting steak chef of the year for putting a cow in a cement mixer.

It might end up being the steak to end all stakes.

It's certainly going to be tender, but it's not finished yet.

Of course, you don't need to be a rocket historian to know that the darts of peace in the Middle East have not always landed flush in the treble 20 of strength, durability, and everlastingness that Trump has said his peace deal will produce.

Let's just wait and see how it all pans out.

Let's not count our chickens before the fish has started contemplating moving out of the sea to begin the evolutionary process that will eventually lead via the dinosaurs and early bird life to eventually the chickens.

Plus, let's not also forget the development of agriculture that enabled the domestication and rearing of poultry and, of course, the discovery of counting as a means of counting chickens.

Will the peace hold?

That was actually a question for our panellists, and their awkward nervous silence was, in fact, the correct answer.

So, two points to both teams.

Right, let's move on now to some British news.

Kemi Badenock at the Conservative Conference said that the delegates at the conference could feel the what.

The invisible hand of the free market.

Feel the temptation to defect to reform.

I watched too much of that conference than is acceptable.

Because he started off bad, didn't it?

He had the energy of a speed awareness course.

Anyone going to have another stab at the correct answer?

They could feel the what?

It will just be something about the pure sexual energy in the room.

Closer.

It was the buzz.

They can feel the buzz.

Everyone is telling me about the buzz they can feel.

Is that something in someone's handbag that's gone off

that they shouldn't have at a Tory conference?

Mind you though, it'd break up the day, wouldn't it?

You're making that filthy.

Kevin Bagner also pledged that the Conservative Party would do what to help people afford what?

Is it tax the mega-rich to help people afford the basic things that they need?

Incorrect.

Is it pre-for-a-miracle to help people afford a Tory government again?

No, sir.

They would remove stamp duty to help people afford houses.

Aisha, politically,

housing sort of...

comes up a lot and nothing much seems to change over the course of time.

Is this going to be something that's going to help the Tory?

They're attempting to sort of doggy paddle their way back up the swollen Mississippi of public disapproval.

Is that going to get them well?

Look, I mean, this is a very eye-catching announcement, this idea of abolishing stamp duty for Maine homes if they won the next general election.

I mean, that is a bit like me announcing that next year I've decided that I'm getting married to Pedro Pascal

and you're all invited, and it's going to be an absolutely amazing wedding because they're completely languishing in the polls.

And according to the latest polls, they face electoral wipeout at the next general election.

But look, I just sort of think: if scrapping stamp duty was such a good idea, why did they not do it when they were in power?

And just think of all the things we could have saved-loads of money, loads of lawyers' fees, Angela Raina's career.

Like,

she did a little tease with the stamp duty fee as well in the speech where she said she's looked at all the figures and was wondering if she'd be able to reduce stamp duty.

And she went, and I've decided we can't.

We're gonna abolish it.

And everyone's like, Wah!

Everyone's jumping up, but it's euphoric, because if ever there's a room full of people who are desperate to get on the property ladder,

apparently, I read something that said, Her speech started with a short video of her highlights from being in charge of the Conservative soccer.

Surely there's got to be an amount of time where short is too big a word for

it would just be a video of the highlights and it would just go Kemmy and

but I guess you have to see it in context of how long some of their other recent leaders have lasted and she's done an epic I mean she I think up to already something like 8.6 trusses

I think the video yeah maybe the video is just time lapses of lettuces dying

with outlived four

Kate any other sort of policy announcements that really grabbed your attention?

That they were going to repeal the Climate Change Act.

I just think because we just had the hottest summer on record, and then one day I went home to visit my mum during one of the heat wave days.

My mum's 78, and it was her and my aunt who she lives with, both in the living room with the curtains shut in their underwear, with like their feet in buckets of water, because they couldn't deal with the heat wave.

And I was like, if we have another summer like that, then the Conservative voter base will just die off.

I welcome this news about the because there's news about the renewables overtaking fossil fuels as well, isn't there?

Which is which is sort of flies against what she said.

And I think that's quite good because it alleviates some guilt a little bit.

Because I thought, because we'd changed the straws and that, I thought we'd done enough.

I thought we'd get a couple of decades out of that.

But my daughter, so my two children are like little Greta Thunbergs, basically.

So every time I turn up the thermostat, they look at me like I've slapped a dolphin.

And so she's doing something for the Rainforest Trust this week, a little exhibition, and she's had to write to me.

And I just want to just read it very quickly, just to say that we're in good hands.

This is the future that are going to be dealing with the planet.

And she's basically said: if we don't get our act together, we could lose the Amazon and our lives.

How would you feel if you could have prevented this?

Only someone so cruel could do that to the world.

Surely that wouldn't be you, Dad.

Yes, that's the opening paragraph.

I read this the other night.

I'd had a box of wine in front of Newsnight

and I had to deal with this, right?

She said, please support the Rainforest Trust.

It will be going for a great cause.

And then she says, you wouldn't want 28% of your oxygen going down the drain.

Yours sincerely, Sophia.

And then underneath, she's just put, I know where you'll live.

Being in opposition, the Conservatives obviously have a lot of time on their hands, but what at the conference did Robert Jenrick also have on his hand?

A judge's wig.

Correct.

Yes.

Yes, like a hand puppet.

Yes.

You must think really low of your people if you're giving them a hand puppet.

You don't believe that they can understand an argument.

It was weird.

There was weird.

I mean, kind of, is that the dream for a lot of politicians around the world seems to be that the judicial system is essentially a glove puppet?

It was this, you know, the message Jenrick is sending to the...

Well, I think that's what he was trying to do, but if you had just turned it on without the sign, you thought, this is like a really low-budget version of Spitting Image, you know.

So I mean, and all I could think of, thank God, the wig didn't belong to poor Michael Fabrican.

That was like the only.

So I think Jenrik had a real stinker of a conference because he went in being like, you know, the king over the water, potential alternate leader to Kemi Badenoke, and then he sort of just came out looking like a slightly kind of weird, racist children's entertainer.

And

he did this thing where there was some footage emerged where he was complaining about spending about an hour and a half in an area called Handsworth near Birmingham, and he complained that he saw no white faces.

And I think that just shows you how madly unpopular Robert Jenrick is.

That even his own people were like, shit, Bobby Jay's in town, let's all hide.

And also, he's such an idiot because if he really wants to find any white faces in Birmingham, it's really obvious what you do.

You just go to your nearest curry house, right?

That is basically.

So, Let's have one more question about the Tory conference.

Many people over the years have accused politicians of getting it wrong about Britain.

But what did the Conservatives literally get wrong about Britain at their conference this week?

Oh, yeah, the chocolate bars.

Correct.

They spelt Britain wrong.

And they spelt it Britian.

Yep.

Which was worrying for me.

Because when it says something about, oh, when Labour negotiates, Brit Ian loses.

I'm like, what?

That's me.

Yeah, it's embarrassing.

But this does happen, like, to be fair and to be more balanced.

Apparently, Scottish Labour misspelt Scottish at one of their conferences, and I think that's worse because that's their name.

That's in their name.

That'd be like if I spelt Ian wrong, which actually a lot of Scottish people do.

Of course, they blamed the printing contractor, and I thought, gosh, Michelle Moon will have a crack at anything.

I mean, spelling mistakes are a proud part of our national heritage.

Stonehenge was supposed to be a hedge

for storing stuff.

And of course, King Canute.

Yes, they all assembled, some better known than others, in a big room and argued amongst themselves about who's faithful and who are the traitors.

Just a regular Conservative Party conference.

The Conservatives at the moment coming across very much like lobsters in the fish tank of a seafood restaurant, arguing over who gets to sit by the window.

Right, at the end of our Tory conference round, it's six to Ian and Kate, four to Scott and Aisha.

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we have a special round now.

According to Blumberg, Cristiano Ronaldo has this week become the first footballer to become a what?

Anyone?

Nobel Peace Prize winner?

Not yet, but he's got to be on the list, I reckon.

Is it to go back to work as a plasterer?

Because he just wanted to feel normal again.

Who have you got to do in the bathroom?

Ronaldo.

He's a billionaire.

Billionaire.

First footballer to become a billionaire.

Who would have thought playing for super-rich oil barons

would be so profitable?

So, in tribute, in this round, we have replaced part of a news headline from this week with Cristiano Ronaldo's name.

So our panelists just have to tell me what the headline should be.

So we'll start with this one.

Police forces have been given new powers to protect communities from repeated exposure to Cristiano Ronaldo.

It's the anti-protest powers, isn't it?

Apparently, it's the cumulative disruption, isn't it?

Where they're saying that if a protest has taken place on the same site for weeks on end, you have to instruct people to hold it elsewhere.

But if it's a picket line at a place you work at, I don't know what you do there.

Do you have to have an away fixture somewhere else?

Like a Sunday league game, you you know.

But yeah, and six days' notice that you need for demonstration, but you need no notice for a stationary protest.

So I think that's a loophole.

So when the police are out looking, you just move a little bit and a little bit.

So it's a big game of what time is it, Mr.

Wolf,

basically.

I think the thing about these protests is that the police are turning up really heavy-handed, and it is just a bunch of angry pensioners.

And I think they need to just realise do not mess with pensioners.

And I don't know how this ends, you know, like dawn raids across the country at Morrison's cafes.

I don't know, you know, mass arrests at National Trust sites on a Sunday or sniffer dogs trying to catch anyone in central London with a bag of Werthers originals.

I don't know where this ends.

I think you're right there, because I know old people sort of sit around all day just getting charged up, don't they?

In front of loose women, they just get angry.

Yeah.

I think we should go harder on protests in this country.

I think we should protest like every little thing.

Like I was in Paris recently and I was at the bus and the bus wasn't coming for ages.

I remember someone had taped up a note, and it was like, We're striking because they're trying to change the bus route.

And I was like, The level to strike for the bus route, you know.

When you should have seen in France, what happened when the cakes were slightly disappointing?

Well, I mean, the police have been given these powers, but what I want from our panelists: if you know, if they were the government, what new powers would you randomly give to the police?

I think they should be allowed without warning or provocation to be able to taser a street performer.

But if it's a human statue and they don't react to the taser,

they get amnesty forever.

I was going to say critical thinking skills, but I don't think it's going to go down very well.

I think the problem is, I would use it for petty grievances.

I think that's the problem.

I I think anyone who goes to a petrol station, fills up and goes in and does a full week shop,

instant arrest.

Do you know what I mean?

Wandering around like it's a fruit market in Sri Lanka.

You're in a Londis on the A1.

Move.

I'm sorry, this actually happened.

That's why.

As soon as they get the bags for life, cuffs on in the van.

I would give the police the power power of love, but they'd have to choose between Frankie Ghost to Hollywood, Huey Lewis in the news, or Jennifer Rush.

Yes, the police have been granted exciting new powers to protect communities from disruption caused by protests.

Right, one final question in this round.

A record legal claim has been launched due to the unwanted and dangerous presence of Cristiano Ronaldo in Three Rivers.

What's the real story here?

I think this is about this case where thousands of people have signed up for this lawsuit against these major poultry producers and a water company because they're polluting loads of rivers in Wales.

And apparently, it's the worst thing to happen to a Welsh area of natural beauty since Tom Jones discovered fake tan, so it's really, really, really,

really bad.

It's interesting, it's the River Wye.

They've classified it as unfavourable improving.

Now it's unfavourable declining, which sounds like my school report actually.

Apparently, it's because of some intensive farming in that area, and particularly poultry.

I think it's one big chicken toilet, is what they've said.

And scientists, this is incredible, from River Action UK counted 24 million chickens in the wide catchment area, which was a long day.

Ian, are you

do you use rivers often?

Oh, well, yeah, I'm a big polluter of rivers.

Yeah, well, I just think, um, you know, sometimes you think, well, if the water companies can do it, why can't we do it?

If you can't beat them, join them.

So, yeah, I shit exclusively in the Thames.

Yeah, and

I get weird looks

going over Tower Bridge.

Has it ever opened the Thames?

Yeah, well,

because they know me now, and when they see me going on there, they start bringing it up.

But I've got a strong grip.

It's the biggest legal claim ever brought over environmental pollution in the country.

More than 4,000 people want the rivers Why, Lug, and Usk cancelled and replaced with cleaner rivers with more modern names.

Why, Lug and Usk.

I think those are the names of the rivers.

They might just be the noises that people make after drinking the water from those rivers.

Right, well, that brings us to the end of our Cristiano Ronaldo round.

And the scores are now 10 to Ian and Kate, and 10 also also to Scott and Aisha.

Which leads us to our drinks round.

So can you explain the following scene from an AI generated kitchen sink drama series written and set in Britain in the near future?

Dennis, what sort of time do you call this?

I don't know, Marjorie.

Is it British supper time?

No, it's 1.30 in the morning and you're drunk.

Honestly, darling, I was just doing my bit to help the economy.

What?

I tell you, I've not listened to the archers in a while.

But I don't remember that episode when they were both hammered.

It is, the pubs are going to stay open till the early hours.

Do you know what I love about the UK?

It just never fails to surprise me.

You can't get a train on a Sunday, but you can get a pint at 4 a.m.

on a Wednesday.

Are our priorities all out of whack?

It's funny, it's the only thing they could think of: keep the pubs open, we love the pubs.

But the thing is, I think we've all, it's too late, we've all been Pavlov's dog by the bell, the Last Orders Bell.

Because when I moved to Berlin, I went to this bar once and he was ringing this bell very often.

And I thought, oh, it's Last Order, so I was buying another beer, another beer.

It got to three in the morning.

I said, why do you keep ringing the bell?

I'm really drunk.

And he was like, oh, I just ring the bell when someone tips me.

When I hear the last orders, when the bell goes in the pub, I just do one more lap of the pub.

pub.

Yes, a cheeky extra sniffer in the pub is going to become a patriotic act of economy supporting heroism.

After new government plans that will see pubs allowed to stay open longer, it'll be a boost for the struggling hospitality sector and for fans of the fragile beauty of a frozen pile of vomit on a street corner glinting on a crisp winter's morning.

Our next question.

According to new research, what has caused one in three workers to pull a sickie?

Is it like when you stand on a rake and the and it slaps you in the face?

Is that still happening?

Right.

How long did you last in that job in the garden centre?

It's not that, no?

Is it the thought of a corporate awe dee?

That could well be the case.

Any other suggestions, Kate?

Hangover.

Hangover, correct, yes.

One out of three workers have pulled a sicky due to a hangover specifically at a works event, after a works event.

Was this survey done in Dining Street during Covid?

Yeah, one in three.

Is this higher or lower than you would have expected?

I think maybe lower.

I thought we were bigger drinkers than that.

It's actually one in two, but the researcher was pissed as well.

They suggest these things all the time to feel they have to, you know, like yoga, crafts, pottery.

But I'm a traditionalist.

I think you can't beat a WhatsApp group just slagging off the bus.

Brings everyone together, I think.

Any other suggestions suggestions for sort of non-booze based social activities to foster a canoeing trip at the River Wye

one in five people also in this research said that they'd said something to a colleague that they then regretted whilst drinking at a work event what's the most regrettable thing

I know I've said stuff to people but the problem is I don't remember it

my issue is one of my colleagues is my wife you see I do a podcast with my wife we record on a Monday so it's been great for us it means on Sunday we're psychopathically nice to each other.

As soon as the MP3 is saved, we're back to normal service.

I think it's difficult.

I think, you know, when you work with someone, there's not many married couples in comedy, but there are a lot of married magicians and assistants.

And I think that's because you can hide the tension.

Because when he's putting the swords in the box and she's pushing them back out, that's not how that's meant to go.

It's difficult to walk out on someone when your legs are in a different box, your body

One in three workers admitted to calling in sick because of a hangover after a work social event.

One of the others is still asleep, and the third one is locked in the toilets at a nightclub wearing a chunda-covered lanyard.

Right, well our winners, therefore, are Scott and Aisha.

Congratulations.

News is reaching us.

American pop gigga star Taylor Swift has released another new album, the short-awaited follow-up to last Friday's The Life of a Showgirl.

Her new album is What I've Done Since Last Friday.

Well, thank you for listening to the newsquiz.

I've been Andy Zoltzman.

Goodbye.

Taking part in the new squiz were Ian Smith, Scott Bennett, Kate Cheker, and Aisha Hazarika.

In the chair was me, Andy Zoltzman, and additional material was written by Alfie Paken, Jane Edwards, and Ruth Husco.

The producer was Rajiv Currier, and it was a BBC Studios production for Radio 4.

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