I just wonder, what, what does that mean in practice? You kind of made the rhetorical point, but what are you now telling people that they can't have?

Well, it's, you know, it's not just a rhetorical, uh, device.

It is the hard facts of life, and people know it.

Um, I think people see the worldwide pressures, the global economic shocks, the war in the Middle East, and the Russia war on Ukraine, and they can see the impact it's having at the pumps, they can see it in their mortgage payments each month.

Um, and they understand that it's putting pressure on government as well.

So that's, that's the first thing.

The second thing is that that requires us, not just as an economic must, but actually as a moral duty as government, to make sure that we control the finances.

Mm

This is the, so it's a

red tie.

Red tie with blue splotches.

Hand printed.

Hand printed, yeah.

These are leaf imprints and feathers.

And this is Gordon Brown's signature on the back.

And as the Chancellor, you didn't mention that at all in your speech.

say.

Well, we've seen too much speculation in previous years.

And it isn't just a matter of interest for the media.

This has real world effects.

It means people hold back investment.

So it damages the economy.

It's seen in recent years people cashing in their pensions.

trend.

On that point, just a few moments ago, John Healey, your new Chancellor, spoke for the first time since being appointed as the new Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Quite simply, tonight it's just great to be back in the Treasury after nearly 20 years, and just a huge honour to be here as Chancellor.

I want to first thank my predecessor, our previous Chancellor, Rachel Reeves, for all the service she's given this country.

She brought financial discipline, she enabled growth, and she will always be remembered as the first woman Chancellor in 700 years.

For me, the Prime Minister and I have talked about how we will work in lockstep to meet the fiscal rules with a buffer against uncertainty and how we'll make life more affordable for working people right across the UK.

And I join you, just having come off a call with the Governor of the Bank of England, and I've conveyed this also to him.

What sort of help? What's the extent of the sort of help that we can expect to

see? The idea of the announcement tomorrow is for the prime minister, but Andy Burnham and I have known each other a long time.

What made John Healey pursue a life in public service?

That was a passion for that day-to-day involvement and help with people.

I was a basic nursing assistant in the old days in the 1980s when the Margaret Thatcher government was closing big psychiatric hospitals and simply putting people out into so-called care in the community.

My job was to try and help get deeply institutionalized people capable of a degree of independence without the support or even the assessment they needed of their needs.

And so I just felt really angry about the system, but enjoyed that work.

And I thought I had a decision to take as, as my future career.

Either I was involved in that almost pastoral side of involvement with people day-to-day, a social worker, teacher, nursing assistant, or I dealt with policy and tried to change the system.

It's not got a great record, has it, for spending money well?

These are the

networks on which our way of life depends.

You know, half of our gas comes through pipelines under the sea.

Trillions of pounds each day is part of the trade.

99% of our telecoms and our data comes through cables under the sea connected to the UK.

So...

If an adversary like Putin holds those at risk, then they threaten the way that we live.

Just Norway.

This is our gas pipelines from other countries.

These are the, these are the, the, the networks on which our way of life depends.

You know, half of our gas comes through pipelines under the sea.

Um, trillions of pounds each day is part of the trade.

Ninety-nine percent of our telecoms and our data, uh, comes through cables under the sea connected to the UK.

So, uh, if an adversary like Putin holds those at risk, then they threaten the way that we live, they threaten the lifeblood of our economy as well as our security.

And so what I've done today is to, uh, set out a very substantial UK Armed Forces operation alongside Norway and other allies over more than a month, which has demonstrated that we're alert to Putin's threat.

What, even when he threatens to end an entire civilization?

But it never happened before.

What I'm, what, what, what I'm saying, what I'm saying to you is, uh, it is, it isn't, it is not an instrument that the British state and our society should reach for.

And ministers at that time, in August 2023, and the previous Conservative government chose th- an injunction, not accountability, and for nearly two years, you have been prevented from reporting on this, the public have been prevented from knowing about this, and parliament has been prevented from scrutinizing this.

That situation has changed now.

It has only changed because we got to the position where I was able to commission the Rimmer Report.

We've got a, uh, an updated threat assessment and, and, and risk assessment, particularly related to the, uh, highly unlikely, um, nature of the fact that Rimmer concludes that a... being on the database is going to increase the, uh, risk to, to anyone in Afghanistan.

And we've got to the position, the position now where we can take these, we can take these steps.

It's about the daily mail.