I went to cover Nato, but this happened instead… | BBC News — Transcript

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1. 0:02That's not quite how I expected this
2. 0:04summit to go.
3. 0:09>> Right. Should we give it a go? So, we're
4. 0:12at the airport. This is the Prime
5. 0:14Minister's Plane, and we are heading off
6. 0:16to the NATO summit, the Defense
7. 0:18Alliance. Uh the prime minister went to
8. 0:20NATO on his first foreign trip as prime
9. 0:23minister two years ago and here we go on
10. 0:25what will be his last foreign trip to a
11. 0:27big international gathering before as we
12. 0:29expect he stands down in a couple of
13. 0:32weeks time. So we have about a 4-hour
14. 0:33flight uh to the Turkish capital. Let's
15. 0:36go. We'll get on the plane.
16. 0:43You know traveling with the prime
17. 0:44minister abroad is such a privilege and
18. 0:47quite an experience. very different from
19. 0:49going to the airport when you're going
20. 0:50on your holidays. The prime minister and
21. 0:53his officials and advisers on the front
22. 0:56steps, they sit through the curtain in
23. 0:58rather posher seats than uh we're uh
24. 1:01sitting in, but quite often we get a
25. 1:03chance to chat to him and chat to the
26. 1:05advisers. It's quite something to be
27. 1:07able to have that access and be able to
28. 1:10ask those questions on on your behalf.
29. 1:15And also
30. 1:18>> the thing is with these trips abroad
31. 1:20both for the journalists and for the
32. 1:22prime minister is that politics from
33. 1:25home follows them overseas. So of course
34. 1:28when they come to a summit the
35. 1:30international agenda is big but what's
36. 1:33going on back at home still makes news
37. 1:35and they still face questions about and
38. 1:38on this trip the big story was all about
39. 1:42Nigel Farage. Today I will resign as a
40. 1:46member of parliament for Clapton on Sea,
41. 1:49thereby forcing a bi-election. No, I've
42. 1:52decided that the people of Clapton
43. 1:55should be the judges of my actions. So
44. 1:57we're now in Anchora, the Turkish
45. 1:59capital at the NATO summit and Nigel
46. 2:01Farage, Reform UK MP and leader giving a
47. 2:05live statement uh filmed by Reform UK,
48. 2:09which we're watching live now to see
49. 2:11what he's saying about his future. Let's
50. 2:13speak to our political editor Chris
51. 2:16Mason and he says this is the people
52. 2:18versus the establishment.
53. 2:20>> That's exactly how he is framing it and
54. 2:23trying to seize the initiative and the
55. 2:26momentum if you like frankly having had
56. 2:28his back against the wall. In my job,
57. 2:30wherever possible, I want to tell the
58. 2:32biggest political story wherever I am.
59. 2:34And if it means talking about a election
60. 2:37contest on the Essex coast whilst being
61. 2:40in the Turkish capital, well, so be it.
62. 2:43And I did plenty of that, including
63. 2:45standing on a roof of a hotel in Anchora
64. 2:49and talking about that bi-election.
65. 2:51>> Chris, we will let you get back to the
66. 2:53geopolitics of NATO in Anchora. Thank
67. 2:55you very much, Chris Mason, our
68. 2:56political editor.
69. 2:57>> Thanks a lot. Cheers.
70. 3:02So, I'm about to do a live onto the
71. 3:05Today program off the back of an
72. 3:08appearance by Count Binface, who is
73. 3:11going to run against Nigel Farage in the
74. 3:13Clctton bi-election. And we're saying
75. 3:15all of this from a hotel room in anchor.
76. 3:19>> You appear to be in outer space and
77. 3:21wearing your bin.
78. 3:22>> What else would you expect, mate?
79. 3:23>> Oh, he's in vision face.
80. 3:26>> Terrific.
81. 3:30Well, I'm in Anchora in Turkey at the
82. 3:32NATO summit, Nick and and woke up to a
83. 3:34request uh from the mighty today program
84. 3:37for our contacts for Count Binface. We
85. 3:39were able to and yeah, we embark on this
86. 3:42bi-election campaign after maybe a spot
87. 3:44of reporting geopolitics today and and
88. 3:46an insight there really into where Nigel
89. 3:48Farage now finds himself.
90. 3:51Tears. See you. There we go. That bin
91. 3:55face interview, it's quite the thing.
92. 4:03So best part of a day into this trip and
93. 4:05all of that talk about Nigel Farage and
94. 4:08Count Binface. We are at now the main
95. 4:11NATO summit venue with all the talk yes
96. 4:14about diplomacy and in particular what's
97. 4:16been happening overnight uh in the
98. 4:18Middle East and what Donald Trump's had
99. 4:20to say about Iran. They are behaving
100. 4:22very badly as they have for 47 years and
101. 4:27you know we hit them hard last night.
102. 4:28>> Good morning and it's really good to be
103. 4:30here for what will turn out to be a very
104. 4:32important NATO summit with the ongoing
105. 4:36conflict in Ukraine and recent
106. 4:38developments in the straightforward
107. 4:40moves. A
108. 4:40>> lot going on Chris uh on the
109. 4:42international stage and domestically.
110. 4:44Let's start with what's going on there
111. 4:46at the summit. Yeah, Vicki, morning to
112. 4:48you. It's no longer
113. 4:50>> This summit for a good number of weeks
114. 4:52now was a deadline circled in the diary
115. 4:55for the government to have made sure
116. 4:57that it had published what it called its
117. 5:00defense investment plan. This package of
118. 5:03ideas for what to spend an increasing
119. 5:06amount of defense budget upon and also
120. 5:10how it is paid for. Now quite a bit of
121. 5:12the headache of Harris paid for will be
122. 5:14left to uh Andy Burnham because there's
123. 5:17some gaps in the budget. To get to that
124. 5:19number from where we are now is one heck
125. 5:22of a hurdle and how the next prime
126. 5:25minister and perhaps the one after that
127. 5:27try to do that is going to be one of the
128. 5:29central challenges of our time
129. 5:31politically.
130. 5:31>> Well Chris, when you get back here to
131. 5:33the UK, you're going to be covering a
132. 5:34bi-election in Clton, aren't you? What's
133. 5:36going on? The argument I hear from
134. 5:38reform folk is that they kind of had
135. 5:40their back against the wall with all
136. 5:41these questions that were swirling about
137. 5:43money. It is extraordinary for me to
138. 5:45think that this is the last time I'll be
139. 5:47on the prime minister's plane in the
140. 5:50company of Kiamer. Uh before that it was
141. 5:53Rishi Suns before that briefly it was
142. 5:55Liz Truss and before that it was Boris
143. 5:57Johnson. all of that within the last
144. 6:00four and a bit years. And the next time
145. 6:03the prime minister takes a pack of
146. 6:05reporters with him, in all likelihood
147. 6:07it'll be Andy Bernham. Perhaps it'll be
148. 6:09um in the autumn. There's the UN General
149. 6:11Assembly where loads of world leaders
150. 6:14block up every street in New York with
151. 6:16colossal motorcades for a few days.
152. 6:18Prime Ministers often go to that. Let's
153. 6:20see if the new one does. And there will
154. 6:22be a fifth prime minister in just the
155. 6:25time that I've done this job in the last
156. 6:27four and a bit years. Building up those
157. 6:29relationships that are so central to
158. 6:32international diplomacy and doing that
159. 6:35from scratch again. Time then to fly
160. 6:38home.