'I'm going to start prepping for a crisis' | James O'Brien - The Whole Show

I wasn't intending you to make suggestions for the thing about which we should change our mind because the world is and has so obviously changed

I'm confident, Steve, that I am never going to review my opinion of Dominic Cummings' approach to testing eyesight

God, there's a name we haven't heard for a while, eh? He's probably busy smoking cigars and reflecting upon how he's been proved right about everything

sarcasm, sarcasm alert and similarly Javier it's not a reflection upon how rightly his trust has been

proved by events I'm talking about this government advice that we should prepare

three days worth of non-perishable essentials and I want to talk about it in a way that we've never talked

about this before because I noticed something this morning has really changed

It's the strangest thing. I mean, big things that you change your mind about

I don't even know if this counts as a big thing. And we've already used up the Hemingway line, haven't we

about things happening. And now I'll get it wrong. First quickly, then first slowly, then all at once

You change your mind incrementally, usually. When you actually notice that your mind is changing about something

there's already quite a lot of legwork that has been done, subconsciously. I'm pretty sure that the very last time I asked you questions about preparing for

crises, I did so with my tongue in my cheek. I did so with a vague sense. I probably even used

the phrase tinfoil hat. I did so with a vague sense of mischief. I think I wanted to take the

mickey. And in many ways, I'm not talking about the people who've got nuclear bunkers and 10 years

worth of lemur beans in a sack at the back of the garage. I'm actually talking about you and me

and the fact that if we don't change our mind sometimes, we are idiots

Yeah, and I'll stick with idiots because I'm talking about myself or we are fools

And it's really interesting to me when it happens. It's really interesting because

I don't think, at least I hope, I was never rude or obnoxious about so-called preppers

If I was, I mean, you know, I don't like being obnoxious by accident

I'm a big fan of being obnoxious on purpose, but I don't like causing unintended offence

I like only to cause intended offence. There's nothing worse than pointing out the awfulness of someone and worrying that your punches aren't landing

More on that later. But I do think that it sometimes stops us from recognizing our own errors or from changing when the facts change

You know, the more embedded you are on an opinion, oh, preppers are a bunch of loonies, the harder it is to then turn around and say, do you know what

I think they're probably, I don't know that they're being proved right by events because the world has changed from when they started doing what they were doing

but um i'm beating about the bush aren't i i'm gonna do it i'm gonna do it i am going to follow

the government's advice go a little bit further and buy all of the things that they are telling

us to buy some of which i've already got i have to be honest with you because my wife is a little

bit more um intelligent than i am but i i'm gonna do it all and i want to tell you why because

immediately you will have idiots uh using words like scaremongering the people who told you brexit

was going to be brilliant. The people that told you Donald Trump was going to be an amazing ally for

our country. The people that told you Liz Truss was an economist. It's so bizarre

that this is a tribe of people. Why can't they just pick one or two things

to be an idiot about? Why do they all have to go all in on all of them? Donald Trump's going to

be amazing. Boris Johnson's going to be brilliant. Brexit's going to be great

Liz Truss is an economic genius. Donald Trump's the best thing to happen since sliced bread. And it'll be the same people

that get, um, With a little side order of people that still sort of think that COVID wasn't real or still want to argue that it was all a big hoax or that vaccines cause more harm than good

You have to move with the times. And I couldn't quite believe it this morning when I just casually and calmly clocked myself thinking, yeah, I'm going to do that

I'm going to do it. And I think the question today, if you're in the same boat as me, is going to be why

What is it that has changed that you think has actually changed your mind

I've made a list of five things that we talk about quite a lot on this programme

I don't think it's a complete list. I think we probably need a slightly longer list

And we will make that list together today. But the five things I've written down, just think about this, are water companies

How often do we talk about that? We talked about it earlier this week, the fact that privatization and perhaps other issues have created an absolutely catastrophic context for water companies from which wealth extractors have taken huge amounts of money while the quality of the service they provide has gone off a cliff, polluted rivers and shortages and empty reservoirs

We talk about that all the time. How often do we talk about energy? We talked about it earlier this week in the context of the government's decision to open that gas field in the North Sea, Jackdaw

We talk about energy all the time. And we talk about, on this program at least, the fact that the companies continue to make enormous sums of money

even as a lot of the energy being derived these days is coming from sustainable sources

So again, that rapacious pursuit of profit has put us all in terrible danger

Well, put us all in danger, potentially. So that's two things on the list

Water, who here is confident that the water companies are doing a bang-up job

and you've got absolutely nothing to worry about? Really? Would you like to buy a bridge

Energy, who here is confident that the energy companies are doing an absolutely bang-up job

And they're both all privatized, remember, and there's absolutely nothing to worry about

What do you think the third thing on the list is? It's not in any particular order. The third thing on the list is Russia

We talk a lot about Russia and the obvious threat that they pose to us

both explicit and implicit, both overt and covert. A story in the Telegraph yesterday that sort of made the hairs on the back of your neck stand on end

when it comes to the efforts that they're putting into sort of listening in to us, really

But you also know that they interfere in democratic exercises in the West

in American elections, in Brexit referendums, in general elections. and God knows what they're doing

Well, I mean, God does know what they're doing on the internet, but they are obviously corrupting public discourse

and working 24 hours a day, seven days a week, to persuade the rest of the world and many people in this country

they're furiously hard of thinking, that we are some sort of immigration hellhole

utterly at odds with observable reality, but of course they rely upon you not bothering to observe reality Ignore the evidence of your eyes and ears The party final most terrible command So that three things that are what you might call game changers

Water is not like it was when I was a kid, something that you can take for granted. Energy

is not like it was when I was a kid, something that you can take for granted. All right, that's

not true, actually. We had power cuts when I was a kid. I don't know if anybody suggesting that you

keep candles in the cupboard under the sink in the 1917s would have been accused of scaremongering

by Boris Johnson-flavoured Brexiters, but maybe. So that's three things, water, energy, Russia

Then we talk a lot about the internet, the fragility of the internet

and the susceptibility of it both to deliberate and accidental frailty

Talking yesterday with Will Gaia about the fact that a flaw had been identified

that left millions of websites potentially vulnerable. So the fragility, if you like, of the internet

before you even include the bad actors and the malevolent forces that want to disrupt the West

because it's the only way that they can hold on to power or money or both

That's four things on my list. Water, energy, Russia and the internet. What time is it? Oh, it's a shame

If it was a little bit closer to quarter past, I might have asked you to guess what the fifth one is

And that's only the first five. Literally, I came in here, sat down, picked up a piece of paper

wrote down five things on it, and that's it. That's the first ten minutes of the program

Five things that explain why, when the world changes, we should probably change our minds

Water, energy, Russia, the Internet. Go on, have a go. Have a go at the fifth one

It's climate change, right? How often do we talk about climate change

How much do we talk about climate change? In today's news, the weather warnings coming into force at this moment

as Storm Austin continues its journey across the UK, has already caused power cuts in 9,000 homes

Now, if you're living in one of those 9,000 homes, you would be listening to me on a battery-powered or a wind-up radio

But government advice to get yourself a clockwork radio, a wind-up radio

is in the hands of some right-wing newspapers this morning, scaremongering or trying to frighten you

So they'd rather you didn't have a means of keeping in touch with the outside world

They'd rather that you weren't capable of feeding yourself because you were prepared for the eventuality of the energy in your home

the energy supplies to your home, the power to your home being cut off

And this is all happening. This is all normal. You might say it's only 9,000 homes in Cornwall and Devon

And you're right, it is in the great scheme of things, a relatively small number. But it ain't small if you are living in one of those homes

What else would we put on the list of things that make you go, hmm, things that have made you change your mind

The water is more vulnerable than I can ever remember it being

Energy, Russia, Internet, climate change. And Trump is still in the White House

you know if if we were in the sort of peril from which we might once have expected our

doughtiest ally to rescue us then well one word for you ukraine donald trump is a russian ally

if not asset he ain't gonna give a hoot about us in the event that we would need some so i don't

even know what it would involve to be honest with you he's reluctant to help americans if they live

in democrat voting parts of his own country but you know that the the idea that the world is a

is a much more fragile place than either it ever was or we ever realized because the fragility may

be one of those things that is omnipresent but not always noticed and i think it is the job of

government to to keep us calm if you like keep calm and carry on is sound advice because panicking

helps nobody but um this isn't panicking this is buying some bottled water quite a lot of bottled

water this is making sure that you've got food in the house that you would um that would be

sufficient to keep you and yours fed for a few days in the event that the refrigeration in the

shops has stopped working or the supply chains could we put brexit on the list you think

and the disruption to our supply chains? I don't know, really. The damage to farming, so Brexit is going on the list

Farming can go on the list because we don't produce enough of our own food, as many people have been telling us for a very long time

Is it panicking to say, why don't you make sure you've got a nice first aid kit? Got some nice painkillers in the house

Is it panicking to say if you've got a Bambino in the house, you should probably stock up on formula

And listen, biggest caveat of all, Not everybody else can afford it

Not everybody can afford it. Some people are struggling to make ends meet now

But that doesn't change the fact that if you can be prepared, then you should be

I've got some very bad news for Alan who says you don't need a wind-up radio. I'm listening to LBC on my phone

Mate, if the power goes down, where are you going to plug your phone in

listen I'm not I'm not teasing you maybe you thought that this meant we were going to come

you've got an emergency battery pack but that is stockpiling that is getting ready for it

so the last time I did this I did it with a sense of fun I like pretty much to bring at least a

scintilla of a sense of fun to almost every conversation that we have. I think as the years

have gone by and we've got to know each other better, we've realized and you've helped me

realize that you can actually talk about pretty hefty and unpleasant stuff with a shared

sense of humanity. It doesn't all have to be doom and gloom. But I want to recalibrate the

needle slightly this morning. I was taking the mickey. Was it only two, three months ago? I was

slightly taking the mickey. I was I was asking you to ring in and tell me that you've dug a big

cellar in your garden and you filled it with Lima beans and you and I was going to sort of

smile at you and possibly giggle. I want to have a very different conversation today. I want to

have a conversation about people who are not preppers, who do not think that World War Three

is on the way, or that the next virus to break out of China is going to be the one that turns

us all into zombies. I don't want the people who think 28 days later is about to become reality

I want to talk, at risk of scaring everybody off, I want to talk to people like me. I want to talk

to people who have started thinking or have finished thinking, yeah, do you know what

I'm actually going to do this. I'm actually going to do this

And I want you to tell me why. 0345 6060 973. So Dad's Army, anybody

Don't panic. Also, don't tell him your name, Keith. Don't panic. Government is not wanting you to panic or scaremongering or any of those things It is simply suggesting that on a morning when 9 homes in Devon and Cornwall don have any power you should perhaps be a little bit

better prepared for that or something similar happening to you than you currently are. So

why are you doing it? Whether you are a lifelong prepper, in which case I'm going to try very hard

not to find you funny and you're going to tell me why I shouldn't think you're a bit silly

a bit tinfoil hat um or like me you are moving very quickly or at least the final stages of the

journey are now underway of your shift from skepticism cynicism and even perhaps a little

bit of uh rudeness to thinking what on earth have i got to lose by by getting ready because all the

things we talk about water energy russia internet climate change trump brexit farming that's eight

would be up to 10 in a minute, all add to the sense that the world is a different place

from what it was when we were growing up. And therefore, being ready for catastrophe, wipeout

temporary disaster, makes a heck of a lot more sense than not being ready

So what are you doing? And why, crucially on this programme, always the why

why are you doing it? It's 10.19. James O'Brien on LBC. It is 22 minutes after 10

You're listening to James O'Brien on LBC. And the slow shift, perhaps, quick for you

from, oh, don't be daft, we don't need to stockpile anything, to thinking, well, hang on, if I was in Devon and Cornwall

and I just lost power to my house, what would I eat? Maybe having a little camping gas stove

and a crate of tins isn't such a bad idea. What else am I supposed to have

Maybe bottled water for three days in case the water goes off? cooking and washing as well of course doesn't need to be bottled it doesn't have to be potable

i think that's the word a bunch of hand sanitizer wet wipes stuff to keep you clean torch spare

batteries blankets sleeping bags warm clothing because the energy goes how are you going to keep

warm got cold yesterday didn't it what about the pets what are they going to eat what are they

going to drink radio why why are you now thinking yeah do you know what a friend of mine it was the

Spanish power outages after the wildfires. And she read a story about the shop emptying

Soon as it opened, it emptied. And then you sort of think, well, I don't want to be part of that stampede

I'd quite like to be ready. And I'll read before I go to Alan, who's in Kimberley. I'll just read this

It's not a very nice message. And it's a bit illiterate as well

But I want to address it because this is the voice of the Brexit-supporting Boris Johnson fan

who thinks Donald Trump is or did think Donald Trump is incredible

and Liz Truss was an ecologist. Why are you stressing people with the electricity cut and so on

Same as COVID. Yeah, mate, because that didn't kill anyone, you absolute flump

You're rushing people to buy more food, even though it's so expensive for some people, even to fill their stomach for today, let alone buy for tomorrow

Yeah, if people buying non-perishable food today will not affect what other people can buy from the shops to eat today

as in perishable food. So, number one, I think you've accidentally tuned into the wrong radio program

because this presumes a double-figure IQ and at least a modicum of basic understanding

And number two, just look up the difference between perishable and non-perishable

Nobody is going to be keeping fresh cheese and carrots for a rainy day

or indeed a disastrous day. So people who want to buy fresh cheese and carrots today

are not going to be compromised in any imaginable way. 10.24 is the time

Alan is in Kimberley. Alan, what would you like to say? Hi, good morning, James

Nice to speak to you again. Likewise. So I've actually been doing this now for the last few weeks

a bit of stockpile. And I think initially when I started, my wife was looking at me a little bit odd thinking

why are you doing this? Do you know what I mean? It's the other way around in our house

But yeah, I know exactly what you mean. But I think for me, my number one concern is Russia

And I know there'll be people out there that will think, don't be so ridiculous. Yeah, because what have you got to fear from Russia

They're a really wonderful bunch of people. He's a flipping humanitarian. I mean, good Lord, anybody who thinks that that's a ridiculous position to uphold

is probably beyond help. Exactly. I mean, there's been enough reports over the last few months

of the ships that have been spotted floating around the North Sea

You're looking at all the underground cables, the pipelines and everything else

That was the story from yesterday, wasn't it? Exactly. You know, so I think we forget we are an island

And to cut us off from mainland Europe, in theory, would not be a difficult thing to do

And that, for me, does worry me a bit. And I think I was saying to your colleague, I think we forget sometimes when COVID arrived in the UK

the, what was it, in the space of maybe like the first couple of weeks

the clearing of the supermarket shelves, you couldn't buy pasta, chopped tomatoes, loo roll

you know, it was just, you know, the queues were out the door

And I think even though that was, what, we're talking now six

nearly seven years ago, possibly now a little bit longer, I think people have almost forgot the panic that happened

when COVID first arrived in the UK. And I think for me, I'm not worrying myself to the extent

where I can't sleep at all at night, but I'm seeing what's happening around us

And I am getting more and more concerned as time goes on

that I think if we didn't prepare ourselves for either, if not necessarily a conflict

but a major issue to the supply chain to the UK, to the harvest, the weather changing

Obviously, they're talking about the El Nino effect that's going to be coming over the next few months

In a way, you need to make it sound normal rather than abnormal. So no one was ever going to make COVID sound normal

because it came at us like a banshee, didn't it? I mean, it was like a bat out of hell, possibly, literally

And therefore, the reaction was unmanageable. We probably could have managed it better

if we hadn't had the Muppet show running the country at the time

But, you know, that ship has sailed. This needs to be kind of like the new normal

So just the very simple idea, I'm going to use the ogy of just having candles under the sink

when power cuts were a frequent occurrence in the 1970s. No one suggested that was excessive or falling for propaganda

or being a victim of scaremongering. Has your wife changed her tune, though, Alan

That's the key question. I think she has, because I think now, because out of the two of us

I'm normally the one that's kind of, you know, watching the news more, listening to the radio more, etc

I think, understandably fair, I think sometimes she finds it just, she finds it quite depressing to hear all that's going off

And I completely understand. Well, I do my best, mate. No, it's no reflection on you

But I mean, for me, it's just been simple little things. Like when I do my, and I know everyone financial position is different and I certainly don want to teach anybody to suck eggs But for me it just been little things Like when I do my weekly shop

I will buy that extra couple of tins of smart price baked beans

or a packet of soap, for example, or a packet of baby wipes

I'm not stockpiling my trolley until it's spilling over onto the floor

But I'm just buying little bits so then if that scenario ever does happen

where we do get cut off for a few days. I mean, I was saying to your colleague, I can't tell how much time I'm taking up

I was saying to your colleague, I remember an article I read in the iNewspaper a couple of years ago

And they mentioned, for example, about the wars of the future, for example

aren't necessarily going to be the wars of troops on the ground, planes dropping bombs, etc

It's going to be like what we've just been hearing this week in the news. It's going to be the hacks

It's going to be the hacks into the electric grid, into the gas grid, into the banking

That's the future conflict, I think, as a nation. We need to prepare ourselves for

Why wouldn't you do what you can to be ready for it? Exactly. What's the line they always say

Failing to prepare is preparing to fail. I like that. Yes, I think that's military

Briefly, have you got a wind-up radio? I actually have. You have

I have got a wind-up radio. Yeah, a AA battery one as well

Thanks. We'll be all right then. We'll be able to keep in touch. It's my middle name, that wind-up radio

It's coming up to half past ten. You are listening to James O'Brien on LBC

Listening to Alan. Alan's a brilliant first caller on this. But, I mean, what's not to like

Why wouldn't you do it? And, again, as we both acknowledge, perhaps you can't

in which case this is not, I hope, an alienating conversation, but if you can, then just do it

Why wouldn't you do it? So why are you? What has changed for you? For Alan, it was Russia, but this list is long

and quite possibly getting longer. Utilities, water, energy, internet, climate change, Trump, Brexit, farming, whatever it might be

What are you doing and why are you doing it? 0345 6060 973 is the number you need

Here's Dominic Ellis with your headline. James O'Brien on LBC. It is 10.34

You are listening to James O'Brien on LBC. And I woke up this morning and went through all my normal routine

I won't bore you or indeed traumatise you with the grisly details

But as I made my way to work, I sort of begin to dip my toe into the news agenda and start puzzling, pondering

got there in the end all the p's on what we might talk about together on the program

and um by the time i got to work i was thinking to myself what why on earth haven't i got on board

with i don't i mean what are we going to call it stockpiling preparing just just being ready

recognizing the uh the dangers of a crisis stock up on supplies to survive 72 hours in a crisis is

the advice from the government. The Be Ready campaign is designed to persuade you to have

enough supplies to last 72 hours. And those who can follow this advice should follow this advice

Those are the words of Dan Jarvis, the security minister. I mean, what's wrong with you if you

think that's scaremongering? I don't mean what's wrong with you in terms of intellectually

what are you struggling to understand? But I mean emotionally, in terms of your character and your personality

what's actually wrong with you? If you think that all of the conversations that we have

about everything from water supply right through to climate change via energy

Russia, the internet, and goodness knows how many other things, what's wrong with you

if you think that's scaremongering rather than just perfectly sensible advice from the people who we rely on

to give us permanently sensible advice? That's a point made rather brilliantly by one messenger who simply said, I'm doing it, James, because for the first time in a very long time, I trust the government

Daz in Norwich has got his sarcastic hat on. He says, I love you, James. Remember, if you want to send me criticism, always preface it with those three words

And there's a much higher chance that I'll read it out. But stop with the scaremongering

Russia won't disrupt our food and power supplies. Putin is an amazing humanitarian

According to Trump's estate agent, there's no way he'll attack us. and speaking of well

Damon has texted WhatsApp 03456060973 with what is and this it doesn't happen that often I'm happy to say

because if it happened every day I'd be thinking that it's time for me to hang up my headphones and let

somebody else have a go Damon has gone straight to the top of the class with this

so if you are seriously I'm going to do it again if you have fallen for

the nonsense from people that told you Brexit would be brilliant, Boris Johnson was a stand-up guy

Donald Trump was going to be a great ally, Liz Truss was an economic genius, Benjamin Netanyahu was a

trustworthy ally. I could go on. If you have fallen for that, which is, let's face it

about 80% of the British media, listen to this from Damon. It's incredible

actually, the brilliance of this insight. So simple, and yet so utterly, utterly perfect

The same people, stroke newspaper, media outlets, who are mocking the stocking

up on food just in case are the same people stroke media outlets who insist that we need to cut

public services to stock up on weapons just in case that's it that's the end of the conversation

oh it's scaremongering how can you be falling for government propaganda Andy Pandy Burnham he's so

scared oh we've got to stop giving money to children um who are hungry and buy more guns

and what buy more bombs because we're living in a state of enormous power I mean it is such

an incredible cognitive dissonance. Oh, don't buy beans. There's nothing to worry about

but buy bombs because there's loads to worry about. I came this close, this close

to passing this insight off as my own, but my conscience wouldn't allow it

Being prepared when it fits your narrative is fine, not so much when you're obsessed

with the myth of the nanny state. It's another one of those phrases. You hear anybody using the phrase nanny state

They are encouraging you to use your political power to protect wealth and damage your own interests

That's what they're doing. That's what it's for. But there it is. I mean, for heaven's sake, should we laminate that, Eleanor

Do you think? Should we laminate? We haven't laminated anything. I say it, sound like Donald Trump

Then I always say it like this. I say laminate. Should we laminate that

It's a bit like James Acaster. Should we laminate it? We haven't laminated anything for a long time

I might laminate that message from Damon. So that's it. Next time you hear someone talking about the nanny state or scaremongering or can't believe that they're making us all panic, just say, where do you stand on defence spending? And why? That's the end of the conversation. That's the end of the phone in. Should we all go home? Oh, it's OK. That's not the phone in we're having. We're not falling into the trap of asking whether or not it's necessary or wise or a good idea because it is. We're just asking what you're doing and why you're doing it

Which thing pushed your button? Which of the myriad different issues going on in the world

was the one that made you... you think yeah do you know what i probably am going to be a little bit more mindful of a

potentially hazardous future joe's in woking joe what would you like to say hello james good morning

hello um so what pushed my button was actually sort of experiencing it actually um so i wasn't

particularly bothered and interested in stockpiling anything no my 20 something year old

daughter was she was but we went off to Seville last May when they had the blackout and we flew

in on a normal day and everything was normal and on our first day of our five days there

everything stopped and it's like a slow dawning that there's no lighting there's no heating there's

no cash did you wake up the next morning or did it happen in the middle of the day no no it was

the middle of the day right it was the middle of the day and we were shopping just walking around

the streets luckily we knew where so we knew how to get to our airbnb because we'd only just walked

out like an hour or so before but lots of on foot on foot i mean cars could still drive until they

ran out of fuel but you but but an awful lot of things would grind to an almost immediate hold

and they did and the traffic lights went down and people who were going to catch an uber couldn't

get an Uber because they didn't have a phone signal and people who needed

to get picked up by their loved ones had to like hope they were going to meet

them at the bridge where they might have met them before. It was like

it just got really quite surreal and I was we were out and we'd had lunch and so

the restaurant, all the lights went out, all of the and the chef came out and said just eat up

all of our food because there's no veggies. It's going to go off. Did they have

any oysters? No, sadly. Oh, right. I was having pudding, though. Every cloud has a lot of pudding

There'll be a lot of cream-based desserts being served up. Very happy. Go on

But as we sat there, one of the things that happened that became remarkable

so my daughter was, I could see she's starting to panic. Yes. And I was like, I've got to hold it together and look like

this is fine, we're going to be fine. Top mumming. Yeah, the more that's going on around you

so people were opening car doors so that crowds could listen to the car radio in Spanish

to find out what was happening. And we, I don't speak Spanish, my daughter speaks a bit

and it was like, we don't know what's really going on. And this guy comes out of their kitchen and says

I've got some news, I've heard the news. It's not just Spain, it's the whole of Europe

So we go from thinking Spain's having a blackout. Or just Sevilla's having a blackout

Yeah, yeah, to the whole of Europe. and so I'm quietly thinking

It wasn't the whole Europe. It was Spain and Portugal. But the story kind of like built

So we're just like, we don't actually know what's going on. So we walked back to our Airbnb

It was the afternoon. We walked back and we thought, we're going to need to like be smart here

We turned all our phones off, all of our iPads. We just dropped all electricity

So even your watch turned it off. And then we sat with a piece of paper

and thought, what would we need if this happened at home? So that's what got me thinking we need things

This is the perfect call. So Damon's insight on defence spending was the perfect text

And we've moved from the perfect text to the perfect call. What a privilege it is to listen to you

What did you write down on your list? We wrote, my first thing she writes down is, we want a gas camping stove with extra cartridges

which we ordered immediately we got home. We need more wood in the garage because we're going to light fires

We need more candles. I've always got 100 tea lights all year since then

If I'm running down, I get another 100 T-lights because you never know. We had matches and we've got lighters now that we wouldn't have had before because we were always electric, right

We bought the wind-up radio, which was actually top of the list, wind-up radio

It has a solar panel. It has a charger for your phone to go in

It has obviously the og or whatever radio, digital radio, and it can shine a light

So we're like, we've got that. We know where everything is, like in an emergency

and the other thing we did was we sat in this apartment and we realized we have no idea what

the time is we have no idea what is the time and so we looked around and the guy in his apartment

had a small ticking clock we literally yeah old-fashioned yeah i've had a battery in it

which we have bought since and we put it in the middle of the kitchen table to look at

because if you're switching off all your power just in case because we didn't know if this is

going to last 12 hours 24 hours four days five you know we we had no idea of course you didn't

trying to keep calm and my daughter is really not keeping calm and we're just trying to make plans

and hoping it all goes to you know the other thing was people needing cash so i came back i took a

couple hundred quid out of cash over the next few days and i've stashed it in my house because i'm

like you never know if the banks don't work you know we might need some money to buy groceries

okay it's on the list it's there cash mix of coins and notes some cards in case copies of ids and

documents and also this is a good one important phone numbers written down because you don't know

many phone numbers not like in the good old days when you'd answer the phone and go hello kiddo

mr six um you knew everyone's phone number back in the day yeah and now you don't so you'd have

to write down the numbers as well if you could get hold of people because it took about 23 hours

for spain's electricity grid to be declared back to normal yeah well and the other thing i did

personally was i came back and i dug out some of my old watches because we're all digital counting

our steps and i got a couple of watches i took them into the shop and got new batteries in so

i've got watches ticking in my house oh i they've been dead for three years that's why you see all

All my friends have got fancy watches. I've got my little swatch. It is battery-powered

But really, you should have some wind-up. Who's got a wind-up clock in the house anymore

My mum's got an old kind of grandmother clock, the ones that hang on the wall, not the ones that are freestanding

That is incredible. And why do you think... I mean, were you surprised by your presence of mind

or are you a bit of a girl guide? I'm not a girl guide

I'm a completely spontaneous, let's do this today type person. But you just knew

You smelt it. in the wind as it were. It was, it became really clear that

it could have been anything that knocked it out. And you know the news this week about all the websites going down

It just reconfirmed, yeah, okay, I've got, it made me think about it. Because you don't know where the attack's going to come from

And that's what really... And it may not be an attack. I mean, I think they still, the official version of events in Spain is

it was a variety of factors. Yeah. So in a way, it's still on, as far as I'm aware

it's going back to March of 2026, when they made the sort of announcement

Yeah, charging the electricity got to a certain level. Yeah, a combination of factors triggered the unprecedented blackout

And, you know, I don't think you need to be wearing a tinfoil hat to think possibly they know a little bit more than they're telling the public

because they don't want the public to panic. And what about food, finally, Jo

Oh, absolutely. So the big tip I can give anyone is go vegan

I mean, there is... My daughter is vegan, right? Oh, now you have to spoil it all by saying something stupid like

No, because it's long-lasting. It's long-lasting. So my daughter is vegan for dietary reasons Her stomach doesn digest whatever and whatever But I would always have normal milk and oat milk I have 10 boxes of oat milk in the outside garage

Because it doesn't go off. It doesn't go off. It goes off next July, I think. Yeah, not for ages

It's like nine months, ten months. So beans and pulses and we've got lentils and things I wouldn't have eaten

We make things with, so we've got some ideas of recipes. But you can open some of these things cold and just go off a load of beans

so even a few weeks ago and she said mum are we are we ready if something happens i'm like i would

tell you mads we're absolutely ready yeah i've got this many beans this many packets this much

milk this much water in last in the summer when the heat wave happened they were selling quite big

lumps of water in a massive heavy one i bought a couple in the local shop thinking well why not

it's cheap and i might need that yeah i mean i don't think anybody can find fault with a single

syllable of what you've said and of course anybody who thinks that they can is going to struggle to

answer the question of why they're in thrall to the politicians and pundits who say we need

to cut public spending in order to buy more bombs or to increase defense

spending because what is that threat that they're so worried about if not the same threat

that is one of the many reasons why you are prepared for

eventualities that we haven't really been prepared for before and you know

we still don't know what happened in Spain well great call Joe thank you

it's all round to Joe's then when things kick off we'll be absolutely golden

We still don't know exactly what happened in Spain. You know, you don't need to put Russia in every sentence

It could just be human error. It could be a disaster that was avoidable

It could be computer error. It could be a million different things. But 24 hours without energy

Who's going to be laughing last? The people who've got three days worth of supplies or the people who haven't

The people who will be sitting there keeping warm with the memories of how they laughed

and use words like nanny state and scaremonger. You couldn't make it up, could you

when you recall, as Damon so brilliantly reminds us, that they are exactly the same people suggesting that we should be

shutting whatever's left of the social capital in this country because they got rid of the short start

They should be shutting down anything that helps people in order to pay more for defence against a threat that doesn't exist

if you're talking about preparedness and stockpiling. It's 1048. James O'Brien on LBC

I think I'd sooner starve to death than eat lentils and drink oat milk

That's one of my favourite contributors. Well, more fool you, mate, honestly

Right, some breaking news for you now. And it's really important news in a bunch of ways

because I should really have added Meghan Markle to that list of things

that is tribal, shouldn't I? You know, the things that people who are being proved wrong

increasingly about everything. Dick Littlejohn's written a column today about Donald Trump

which is unintentionally the funniest thing you'll read all year. More on that later, hopefully

But, you know, pro-Brexit, pro-Boris Johnson, pro-Liz Trust, pro-austerity, pro-Benjamin Netanyahu, pro-Donald Trump, and anti-Megan-Markel, right

I mean, is that a Venn diagram or a circle? Just listen to this from the Press Association

I'm going to read it without interruption. The Duchess of Sussex has said she is deeply distressed by accusations her father had a horde of child sex abuse images

Meghan's brother Thomas Markle Jr. alleged that he had found a stash of images belonging to her father Thomas Markle Sr. at his former home in the Philippines

This was reported in The Sun this morning. In an interview with the Daily Mail, Thomas Sr. denied possessing child sex images calling the accusations sick lies

In a statement first reported by The Sun and issued to the Press Association

Megan said, and you need to pay attention now, I am deeply distressed at the news that has come to light in the last 24 hours

and my thoughts are with any children who may have been harmed. In 2018, a letter was sent to the Metropolitan Police and Royalty and Specialist Protection

That letter was subsequently shared with me. It made troubling and disturbing allegations against my father, and I was given assurances that these were being investigated

I hope it can now be understood that despite certain media publications' distortion over the years

I am going to interrupt, most obviously the Daily Mail, that even when these allegations arose

went straight to the man accused to offer him the opportunity to deny them

I hope it can now be understood that despite certain media publications' distortion over the years

any distance from my father and my choice to not allow him to have contact with our children was for one reason

To protect them. I trusted that the authorities were doing the same for other families

Although the breadth of what has now been uncovered is more sickening than one could ever imagine

My sincerest hope is that justice will be fully served and that the priority remains the safety and protection of innocent children

So the key line there is, of course, the revelation that in 2018, Meghan Markle, the Duchess of Sussex

was made aware of allegations being levelled against her father, was given assurances that they were being investigated

and took the decision as a consequence of that episode to cease or to keep her distance from her father

and not allow him to have any contact with her children. They're poor kids

I say kids. Closer to my age, I think, than a kid's age

but obviously the poor children that are allegedly in these photographs, but what those two have been through is just off the charts

Imagine cutting off contact with your own dad because really unsavory allegations are being made against him

and then opening up a newspaper like the Daily Mail to read that you were heartless or cynical or cold

or to turn on LBC, really, hear the same sort of stuff

Nobody knows. I mean, you know, it's just a question of how much effort you put into picking your targets

That's a horrible story, an absolutely horrible story. And there it is

Nothing to add, really, except, I'm afraid, my absolutely perennial observation about the Venn diagram

that is really a circle. Show me somebody that fits into all those other categories

from Donald Trump right through to Brexit, and I'll show you someone who has been persuaded to hate Meghan Markle

by exactly the same people, same commentators, the same columnists, the same presenters, the same pundits

What are we like? Brexit, Boris Johnson, Donald Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu. What don't we like

Climate change science, Meghan Markle, compassion. Jeez, what a story. Back to prepping

And again, the people telling you that it's all scaremongering and panic are also telling you that we need to cut public spending

in order to spend more on defence. Riddle me that. Beth's in Copenhagen. Wonderful, wonderful Copenhagen

Beth, what would you like to say? Hi, James. I kind of really interested in this topic because we moved to Copenhagen two and a half years ago and actually we were told by the Danish government to prep for two to three weeks worth of stuff

Wow. Did they tell you why? I mean, what sort of... And do they manage to deliver the message in a way

that is immune from the ludicrous mewling and whining of right-wing media in this country

Yeah, and I think that, I mean, we basically got a... there's like a government inbox that you get when you're a Danish resident

And we got basically a letter straight to our inbox saying, you know

there's worldwide threats, blah, blah, blah. They kind of, it was very vague. But, you know, they kind of gave you a list of the kind of things

that you need to be thinking about. So, yeah, I mean, it didn't seem to have the same kind of panic

that I would expect and I experienced, you know, during COVID in the UK

I don't know if it's a different mindset or less kind of fear-mongering by the right-wing papers here

You don't have anything really comparable to the Daily Mail over there

No, not that I'm aware of. It's happily. Therefore, you don't have to suffer the consequences of putting enormous levels of power and trust in the hands of absolute idiots

What have you done? Talk me through your regime. Oh, well, we kind of got the water, the standard stuff

the tins of beans, that kind of thing. And actually, one of the things on the list was iodine tablets as well

which is obviously a little bit worrying. Yes, of course, to purify water, is it

No, what are they for? It's for radiation poisoning. Bloody hell. Yeah

Yeah. And have you got it? Have you got two to three weeks' worth of stuff

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Does everybody? Most people that we speak to, yeah, I think it's quite..

I mean, everybody just has it. It's not even a conversation to be had anymore

because we've... I mean, it's been at least two years that everybody's been doing this

so the fact that it's only kind of being talked about now in the UK

is a bit, you know, kind of points to the... Denmark's geographically closer, I suppose

to one of the major problems here. I mean, I imagine in Estonia, this conversation sounds even more ridiculous

than it does to Danes, you know, or in Poland, perhaps. I'm not sure, actually

Maybe we could extend this conversation into what advice other countries are receiving

But you're getting iodine tablets, water, food, and it is just a completely unsensational conversation

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I haven't seen anything in the papers about it, to be honest

Do you know why we all went mad for toilet paper during COVID

I suspect that they believed, I don't know, maybe one of the symptoms was, you know, explosive diarrhoea

That's the only thing that kind of made it. I look back on that and I still don't think anybody knows

I mean, it's bad enough that we don't know what caused the massive power outage in the Iberian Peninsula

In the great scheme of things, that is a mystery that needs solving first and more urgently

But why did we all go so bonkers for bog roll? during Covid

I think it was just an extraordinary sort of brain fever, wasn't it

Beth, what a perfect call. It's just gone 11 o'clock. You can tell by the cheering tones

in the background that we are at the top of this hour. I haven't decided what we're going to talk about

in the next hour. But Beth has sort of given me some pause

for the original plan to move on to entirely new territory. Because I have in the past

proved that we've got plenty of people listening outside this country to address questions like the one that's now bubbling away in the back of

my mind which is what's the advice in other countries how daft do we look today when we

have much of our commentary at pretending to be outraged james o'brien on lbc five minutes after

11 is the time and you are listening to james o'brien on lbc some very very very hasty rewriting

of copy over on the Daily Mail's website this morning because allegations that Meghan Markle's father, Thomas

allegations levelled originally by his son, by Meghan's brother, Thomas Markle Jr.

that he had found a stash of child sex abuse images belonging to their father

at his former home in the Philippines, prompted the editor of the Daily Mail to ring up Thomas Markle

and offer him the opportunity to defend himself against these allegations. Just mere hours later, Megan herself reveals that she has known since 2018

that allegations of a similar nature had been levelled against her father and that was the reason why she cut off contact with him

and didn't want her children to be in his orbit at all

I mean, you think back to some of the coverage of this couple, of Harry and Meghan, and the various decisions that they've made, and you can't help wondering where the hell his family were when the newspapers were having open season

I mean, the way this is phrased, a letter was sent to the Metropolitan Police and Royalty and Specialist Protection suggests to me that everybody in the inner royal circle would have known about this

She didn't want to go public with it. Perhaps she wasn't permitted to go public with it

But what she could do was cut off all contact with her father and ensure that her children, when they came along, were allowed nowhere near him

and the queue of columnists and editors to castigate her for being cold and unfeeling

or cynical and self-serving for, you know, serpent's tooth territory, wasn't it

If you know your Shakespeare. And all along they were having to deal with this knowledge

All along they were having to deal with the knowledge not only of what they knew, but also of who else knew

what they were being exposed to while the truth was, or at least the allegations

need to be absolutely clear that Thomas Markle has and will deny

the allegations being made against him by his son. That's extraordinary. That's extraordinary

I mean, it feels like a story of such significance that you

I mean, you can make a list now. I sometimes think that when they go low, you go high

I really do. But you can make a list of all the people that have led the charge

On this very specific issue, if you want, if you're not ready yet to admit that the reason why

the Duchess of Sussex has been so maligned by our media is because she is of colour, because she is mixed race

and how dare the paragon of virtue that is the royal family

allow itself to be polluted by ethnicity. That's the bottom line. It might not be why you hate her or you might not realise

that the people who've encouraged you to hate her were motivated largely by race racism and with a side order of snobbery The two go hand in hand Harry decision to want nothing to do with the firm makes a mockery of the entire British class system

because how can somebody who's ended up pretty near the top of it reject it when the rest of us spend our lives either knowing our place

tugging our forelocks and doffing our caps, or desperately trying to clamber up to the next level

by changing our names or changing our accents or changing the way that we do things

Ah, what a story. There's only one question I can ask you

because when they go low, we go high. So I don't want to really engage

I might fail to resist the urge to name-check a couple of people

that have led these particular charges. And, hey, look, we all make mistakes

Facts emerge, things emerge, and you sort of think, good Lord. I got that one horribly, horribly wrong

But if your motivation in the first place was racist, then the likelihood of you making a terrible mistake

becomes much, much higher, of course. I don't want to have a conversation about your attitude towards this couple

because I think they deserve better than that and sadly lots and lots of other people will do that

And we will return to it, don't get me wrong, but just not today. Do you know what I really want to know

You do know what I really want to know, don't you? What's it like when a family member, someone that you love

is that a phone? Would people call me on this? We took an extraordinary call from a woman a couple of years ago

whose husband at the time. Do you remember? She went on his computer

People often ask me, and you're soon going to be able to ask me

any question that you want in a quasi-public forum more on that next week

very exciting news I even had a photo shoot yesterday I get asked quite a lot

about the calls you've never forgotten and it's a bit like asking someone what their favourite joke is

I can never remember in that moment do you know what I mean

but if I actually had a long run up if I had two or three hours

to sit and prepare and really think and go back over archives and things like that

You said, what are the most memorable call? What is the most memorable call you've ever received

That would be right up there. An incredible woman, because she did the thing

that I don't know most of us would do. She didn't try and talk herself out of it

There's another horrible story in America at the moment about a young woman who was allegedly raped by her stepfather

but her mother sided with the stepfather. And this woman's political opponent, I think her name is Amy Acton

but I should double check. This woman's political opponent, who is, needless to say, a Donald Trump fan

has put the mother accusing the alleged abuse victim in his own campaign adverts

that the mother who sided with the alleged abuser against her own daughter

has been put in the campaign adverts of Vivek Ramaswamy, a Trump-worshipping Republican

I mean, it's hard even to work out why, isn't it? But I mention it because Amy Acton's mother

did what a lot of people do and try desperately to either persuade themselves

and or pretend that what is happening in front of them isn't happening

So this woman, this extraordinary woman in Caterick, Margaret, told us about the time that she was using his computer

It was such a middle-class thing as well. I don't know why that resonated with me, probably because I'm so middle-class

Printing out menus for a dinner party, using his computer to print out memories for a dinner party

He clicked on something without knowing what it was. and in her own words, I could not for the life of me

understand what was happening and then suddenly I did. And then continuing the middle class theme

she said, I thought I'd better get away from the computer before I throw up on the nice new carpet

And that's it, that was it. Her life exploded and she exploded with it

She packed the car, she took everything away, she got out of the house immediately

went to stay with friends and called the police. Um, the jails were full

It was 2024 before you try and blame Andy Burnham. The jails were full

So he avoided jail. Um, but his three-year sentence was instead suspended

What, um, what do you, what on earth is it like to be where Meghan Markle apparently was in 2008

to find out that a family member, a loved one, is, what should we say, in possession of images of child sex abuse

And remember, in the context of Thomas Markle, these are all allegations. These are all allegations

And he has denied them. But what's it like to discover? Have you been where Megan was

has this happened to you what what will she be going through what what would she have gone through

back in 2008 and um and what was it like for you oh three four five six oh six oh nine seven three

is the number that you need um because i mean this won't change much for a lot of people

not going to sit there and go oh maybe i maybe i've been a bit unkind to her maybe i've been a

bit misled i don't really know why i've been persuaded that she's so awful but definitely

the fact that she abandoned her own dad was one of the reasons most people aren't gonna

none of the cheerleaders of this process are going to make honest amends for what they've done

um 2018 she's known good lord what happened in your family because i i presume it breaks families

down the middle some people don't want to believe the allegations and even convictions post

conviction you will have people standing by the abuser in the same family as the abused

I wonder if you can talk about it. I wonder if you can tell me what it's like

What happens when your world blows up in this way? 0345 6060 973. As we discover that the reason why

Meghan Markle cut off all contact with her father was almost certainly allegations involving images of child sex abuse or worse

What happens when, or what did happen when it was in your family

0345 6060 973 is the number that you need. And you know that I can guarantee very little in life

but I can guarantee you a safe space to talk about this hideous happening

It is 11.18 and obviously you don't have to tell me your real name or any identifying detail

but the extraordinary nature of this story, given the abuse that Harry and his wife, Harry and Meghan

have received from the media over the years, not least for cutting her father out of their lives

just makes me wonder what that's like. Makes me wonder what a family does in these situations

And the only way really to explore that question is by asking you what happened in your family

What happened in your family? And how common it is for people to make the surgical cut, as it were

to say we want nothing more to do with you. Listen, it may not be a phone in this

I'm always in your hands on days like today. responding to breaking news, responding to very live events

and responding in the only way that I can think of. But it may not be something that you are ready or prepared to discuss

If you think that you might be, then the number that you need is 03456060973

And the question very simply is about what happens when a family discovers that a member of it has actually engaged

We don't even need to talk about allegations in the context of your life. We talk about allegations and we keep saying the word allegation

in the context of Thomas Markle. He stands accused by his own son and now, of course

accused by his own daughter, referring back to events in 2008. But the question in your family may not even be allegations

It may be knowledge. It may be convictions. It may be criminality

And I just want to know what I mean, of all the things you can't imagine, of all the things about which you know nothing until you suddenly need to know everything

This has got to be at the very top of the list, hasn't it? It is so utterly beyond comprehension

I mean, for people who haven't had this happen in their lives, in their worlds, this is so utterly, utterly beyond comprehension that you're either sitting there thinking, I can't talk about this, or you're sitting there thinking like I am, I have absolutely no idea what this would be like

to not be believed as well is a huge part of this phenomenon isn't it to tell somebody that you

trust i remember many years ago when we first started discussing child sex abuse in the catholic

church uh something that later became very relevant to me because of events that happened

at my catholic school and um the worst calls we ever took were from people who told their mums

what the priest was doing and their mums told them off that's what I mean about

it is far from guaranteed it is far from certain that when you make these

allegations or when you finally find the courage to come forward with these accusations it is far from

certain that the people from whom you most expect support and the people from whom you most

need help it is absolutely not guaranteed that you are going to receive it

And that, I mean, talk about compounding the horror. That's extraordinary. And the dimension to this story that I don't think we should ignore

although obviously we may never know all of the details, is that people in the royal family must have watched her

come under attack from the media for alienating her father for the best part of a decade

they must have known the background to this because the letter was sent to the Metropolitan Police and Royalty and Specialist Protection

And nobody ever did anything to call off the dogs. And they can call off the dogs

This is intrinsic to understanding Prince Harry's grievance towards his own family

They can call off the dogs. They can do a quid pro quo

They can break bread with the editors, you know, and they can do deals and they can keep people off limits

I mean, crikey, how do you think his uncle operated? They can call off the dogs and they never have for Harry and Meghan

It's a complete mystery to me as to why, but they've never called the dogs off

And this just adds to that sense of outrage at how little protection they've received from the worst engines of hatred and abuse, rhetorical abuse that almost any country has ever seen

I'm talking about our rabid right-wing media. No protection whatsoever. 23 minutes after 11 is the time

The breaking news is the Duchess of Sussex revealing in the aftermath of her brother's allegations that he found a stash of images of child sex abuse belonging to their father, Thomas Markle Sr

At his former home in the Philippines, the Duchess of Sussex has revealed that in 2018

she was made aware of a letter sent to the Metropolitan Police and Royalty and Specialist Protection that we can only conclude contained similar allegations

Allegations she has described in the last few minutes as troubling and disturbing

she was given assurances that these were being investigated and here's the line that if people

were capable of shame or possessed of consciences they would never forget i hope it can now be

understood that despite certain media publications distortion over the years any distance from my

father and my choice not to allow him to have contact with our children was for one reason

to protect them kev's in swindon kev what made you pick up the phone hi there james um yeah i've

had a really um i hate to say it but i had a pretty rough upbringing um now growing up um i had it

pretty bad my dad was an alcoholic um but abusive one um he'd uh i'd come home several times and he'd

be drunk uh abusing my mom physically as in violence as in violently yeah he'd be he'd be

slapping her and punching her and she'd be trying to fight him off etc oh lord um but yeah and and

then it projected onto myself um so there was this one instance that um you know i came back

from school and the same was happening again i was a little bit older by this point so i tried

getting in the middle of them both yeah um and he pushed me to one side slapped me down um so i had

to run up to the neighbor uh which was quite a way away um so i ran up to the neighbor uh i begged

them to call the police etc i said my dad's trying to kill my mom um so i i um we ended up getting

the police um i came back um with the police because i was too scared to go back and they

arrested him at that point and and taking him to the um the cells um now i'm i'm i'm trying to rush

through it because there's so much that happened um throughout growing up um but you know i um why

did why did the megan markle story trigger these memories because uh my dad is actually a registered

paedophile as well. And I didn know this until I got older I was 18 by the time I found out How did you find out Kev Because my mum told him

My mum told me, sorry. She was still with him? No, no

By this point, she'd kicked him out. Thank God. Okay. But yeah, she told me everything

basically that he'd gone to prison previously for abusing two girls of the age of 13

Right. and foolishly when he came out of prison he begged my mom to take him back and you know

he told her that he changed he was a changed man etc and my mom being my mom you know she's always

she did love him um and i understand that love can be blind yes um so i was begging her not to

take him back you know i was literally begging um and she took him back in the end but you know

each time an incident happened where he'd been abusive to me or to her

I'd always beg her not to take him back, but she would do. And I don't resent her for that fact, you know

Do you not? Good. No, no, of course not. Did you love him? Do I love him

Yeah. No, I don't. I forgive him because I know I have to

For what he did to you? Yeah, for what he did to me. I can't forgive him for what he did to my sister

and this is what I'm getting to now. um i'm sorry yeah i thought no no that's not the end of it no unfortunately um so when when my mom

took him back um he he she had my sister um and all things were fine for a few years and then um

i only found this out by my sister because she told my mom so when my sister was about the age

of six years old. He was abusing her. So he was abusing her in all different manners

I don't think he actually had intercourse with her, but he was abusing her in the private areas, et cetera

So, yeah. And that's when your mum finally chucked him out, is it? Yeah, my mum snapped and she chucked him out

But my sister has never really recovered from this, to be honest with you

I'm not surprised. I mean, it's really weird, actually, because I'm glad that you don't bear any malice towards your mother

And yet a lot of people listening would probably have struggled. You see her as a victim

Yeah. Even as she could have prevented some of the other crimes your father committed

if she chucked him out sooner. Yeah, and this is the thing. You know, obviously hindsight's a wonderful thing

You're right, it is. But, you know, these things, I hate to say it

but it was happening a lot back in those days. Still is, mate

Yeah, I don't doubt it. And it's not class-based either. I mean, you know, it's got nothing to do with the quotes roughness

and quotes of your upbringing. I think we just look at Jeffrey Epstein for a reminder of that

Absolutely, yeah. How has it affected you? Do you find it easy to trust people

I did yes and I look at everybody with the eyes of I can't really trust you

and I look at everybody and I hate to say it but I look at most people and I wonder

are you a paedophile and you know I have children myself so I

I'm protective of them like probably too much protection, but it's more

I don't want them to go through anything I ever had to go through

growing up. So I wrapped them in cotton wool for that fact

Of course you do, mate. It made me who I am today. I'm respectful

I'm quite right. I speak with compassion and I understand people when they're going

through certain things. and I don't judge, you know. You're a good man

What's happened to your dad? I honestly don't know. We haven't had any contact with him

although he did try and contact me when I was working at the time

He found me. I don't know how he found me, but he came up to me at my workplace

and he said, you know, here's my number. And he said, I want to have contact with you

And I said, I do not want to have anything to do with you. and if you come anywhere near me again

I will be calling the police. Good for you. But, yeah, I mean, it made me who I am today

and, you know, I find that... I hear you. I hear what you're saying

and I understand why you're saying it. You know, what does not kill us makes us stronger almost, isn't it

That's right, yeah, yeah. And, you know, I'm probably not as trusting as I should be

but you know it's a difficult one for me and more so for my sister obviously

I mean love from everybody listening to this, to both of you, to all of you

but it is a quiet thank you for trusting me with this story actually

thank you you know when I was listening James it really brought it back

Thomas Markle denies all the allegations but so much of this has happened

in your family that you've got a much better insight into it than i would wish on anyone to be honest with you mate i wouldn't

want anybody to be able to make the call that you've just made but i am glad that you did because

you you remind us of the the ordinariness of the extraordinary or the normalness of the subnormal

and the abnormal in that it doesn't happen in houses that have got big posters in the front

garden saying beware all ye who enter here it doesn't happen in you know buildings that have

got the windows blacked out or the every childhood in the neighborhood avoids the teacher at my school

my first school was was probably the coolest teacher you know and and using that popularity

and that coolness to inveigle his way into people's families i am so impressed that you don't hold it

against your mum because she was a victim not just of abuse but also of course of coercive control

you know the idea and you have to stop yourself Kevin thank you for reminding me

people like me have to stop ourselves from doing things like going

she was still with him unbelievable that's you know it's a victim of psychological torture

if she'd been a victim of physical torture you wouldn't question her responses she did what she got down on her hands and knees

and begged after he punched her of course she did but psychological torture coercive control

so I'm sorry if I fell in that particular trap she's still with him um I got a message off a pal

earlier about this story someone who um knows a little bit too much about this sort of or a little

more about this world than you would wish on on anybody and I didn't pay it the attention that I

should have done I'm going to share it with you in a moment and also I want to hear your story

about what it's like when it happens in your family. 0345 60 60 973

Dominic Ellis has your headlines. James O'Brien on LBC. It 36 minutes after 11 and you are listening to James O on LBC I mean I sure there are lots of people a couple of people pointing out that moving to certain parts of the world can be a big red flag

in this kind of environment. And certainly, if a man of a certain age

decides to go on holiday to parts of Southeast Asia on his own, then I'm afraid in the past

it's raised my eyebrows. But Thomas Markle denies the allegations that are being levelled against him

and it's important to bear that in mind, although Meghan Markle is clearly telling the truth

when she says, in 2018 a letter was sent to the Metropolitan Police

and Royalty and Specialist Protection. That letter was subsequently shared with me

It made troubling and disturbing allegations against my father and I was given assurances that these were being investigated

I hope it can now be understood that despite certain media publications' distortion over the years

any distance from my father and my choice to not allow him to have contact with our children

was for one reason, to protect them. What is it like when this happens in a family? We don't have to

talk about allegations. We can talk about actions or allegations and the idea of taking sides and

divides. But just a thought for this young woman, this young mother, and not only having to deal

with this knowledge, but also have to deal with the most powerful media engines on the planet

accusing her of various crimes of callousness and cruelty for making this decision that she made when

she was made aware of troubling and disturbing allegations against her own father. The columnists

and commentators who queued up to castigate her, that takes a mental toll. You know, some people

I guess sociopaths, some people can be untroubled by it. Some people learn to sort of zone it out. The more of it there is, the easier it becomes to treat it like water off a duck's back

But some allegations in some contexts are immense. Nobody's capable of not responding emotionally to an allegation from something read or seen by millions of people that you're treating your own father callously because you're such a prima donna or you're such a diva

And to know the reason why you've done it. And not be able to tell anyone

And there it is. And so there will be elements of their experience that are common, as Kevin just demonstrated so powerfully, and an awful lot of love for Kevin coming into the program

In fact, I'll read you one, Kev, if you're still there. I'm just listening to the show. I wanted to give a message to Kevin

He's just spoken about his experience with his dad. I wanted to thank him for being so brave and sharing such a personally tragic experience, giving insight into what ordinary people go through and the strength that can come with forgiveness

I can tell he's a good person and his family are lucky to have him. I agree. But there are parallels with, if you like, ordinary families

And it's those parallels that I need your help exploring. Raising Hexham

Ray, what made you pick up the phone? Yeah, morning, James. It's a good subject to discuss

Oh, crikey. Yeah. I worked as a police digital forensic investigator for a number of years

I don't now. but the majority of the jobs I worked on involved child sexual abuse

and my role was to accompany officers on search warrants to assess and yse any equipment found in the home

so the process would be that intel would be received officers would get a search warrant

and it would be arranged to go and undertake it normally 6 or 7 o'clock in the morning

and knock on the door. I've seen so many times, dozens of times

the collateral damage of people involved in this kind of crime. So everybody knows that there's somebody that's committed the crime

and there's a victim or victims, direct victims of that crime. But what's less well discussed is the impact on people in the wider environment

the collateral damage on families generally. so the people who knew nothing about it were neither neither victim nor culprit but they are

victims aren't they yes of course you know in a wider like megan i guess if these allegations are

true and obviously her father denies them but she she is she is a victim exactly so so next part of

the process once we're in the house the person that is suspected is handcuffed and taken away

and that can be a father, less commonly a mother, a brother, a son

I've seen kids getting up from bed, the first thing they see is their dad being taken away in handcuffs

And my job was to assemble all the digital equipment, whatever that might be, and carry out a preliminary assessment

to see if there was any validity in the intel. and that would involve looking at

if it's the dad that's taken away it would involve looking at the mum's phone

the mum's computer it would involve looking at the kids' phones the kids' computers

and you can imagine these sorry I'm being stupid, why? just in case he'd used them or

yeah, that's one of the first questions has he had access to any equipment in the house

and anything that he might have used would need to be looked at

just to see if there's any substance. Of course. And I've seen, you know, they talk about the stages of grief

that people go through, you know, denial, anger, acceptance, guilt. I've seen that happen in a matter of moments in houses

I've seen other people that have hung on to the denial for a long time

I've seen other people that have gone straight to anger and have never moved on from that

But the upshot of that investigation is that If there's any evidence, preliminary evidence found, that person is going to be charged and bailed

And part of their bail is that if there are kids in the house under 18, they cannot go back to that house

And if they're grandparents, they can't have unsupervised access to their grandchildren

And it goes on and on and on. And I think this is the sort of the missed part of these crimes

I think you're right. I think you're right. And just one point I want to make before I go

Well, no, make as many as you want. You'll be aware of the so-called vigilante groups

that take it upon themselves to call themselves pedo hunters, things like that

And then modus operandi is to, you know, actually make that first contact themselves

with an alleged offender. and stream it on Facebook. Now, one of the things that I was always impressed by

was the way in which officers dealt with people in this collateral damage situation

So if dad or son or brother has been taken away in handcuffs, they would spend time with the family there in the house

explaining what has happened, why it's happened, what was going to be happening next But they were taking care to manage those victims Oh Lordy With the vigilantes it like a hand grenade going off in the lives of innocent people

Exactly, exactly. I never thought of that. I've been quite warm towards some of those people over the years, Ray

I've had them in the studio, and the ones I've met motivated. This is before it became commonplace to go around filming yourself

in all sorts of scenarios. I thought that they were doing the Lord's work, but you're absolutely right

I'd never thought of that angle. But you can see that now, can't you, from the Daily Mail splashing this thing

because their whole intention is to shame that person that is involved in the collateral damage

And it goes on and on and on. If the person that's been arrested works with vulnerable people in any way

children, say a teacher, doctor, and there is no profile for a sex offender

No, exactly that. Of course it does. Of course, that's what I was trying to convey when I was saying they don't have blacked-out windows and sinister signs in the garden

Can I ask you a question? Fire away. What did it do to you, this work

Yeah, it's a difficult question, because a lot of my family that knew what I did, their immediate response said

I don't know how you can do that kind of work. you know my response to that is well somebody has to do it and it no there is no doubt it

requires a degree of mental strength to deal with that that kind of material yes and it and it also

needs a capacity to demonstrate good coping mechanisms but i think my advantage was i was

i was quite a lot older when i went into that line of work yeah and i could bring with me

a set of life experiences that I'd learned to cope with and deal with

I was working with a lot of younger people, and there is no doubt that the impact and effect of looking at that kind of material

does have an effect. What effect? You don't have to answer any of these questions

It's just my curiosity and concern, actually, because the people that do this, and I know you'll reject this

but in many ways you're heroes, utterly unrecognized heroes. It's not a job that, as you say, the first reaction of people is not

oh, thank you, thank God someone is doing what you're doing, Ray

The first reaction is, flipping it, mate, how could you do that? And yet if you weren't doing it, nobody would be

Well, it's the same for firefighters, ambulance crews, police, you know. Yeah, I think you're on a spectrum

but I think what you're doing is probably more potential. I mean, do you find it hard to trust people

Do you see, like Kevin did, offenders around every corner? Once you grasp the ordinariness of offenders

and we get rid of the idea that they all look like the child catcher out of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

Does it change how you look at people? No, I don't think it does, James

Good, good. And I think, again, that's partly due to the fact

that I was older going into the job, I had children of my own. I think what it did do

it gave me a heightened awareness of how to keep safe, and that's the information and the knowledge

that I pass on within my own family, in my own circle of friends. So, you know, the online world

is a very dangerous place. I worked on a number of cases

involving the grooming gangs, and some of the social engineering techniques that were used at that time

without them being called social engineering techniques. Very well known and understood now and still happening

To alienate you from the people that you might be able to turn to and to make you think that you're loved

and that the abuser is your boyfriend and all of this stuff. Yeah, yeah

But again, I think my main point to make today about that ripple effect of collateral damage

of people that we don't normally think about as victims, but they are victims

And the impact of that crime can go on and on and on and on

you know, in ways that you perhaps don't think about in terms of, you know, divorce and people losing their job

and that has an impact on the family finances and all that kind of thing. I mean, you're a very compassionate man, aren't you

But only through exposure to the problems that you describe, because most of us are just thinking

string him up, metaphorically speaking, in some cases, literally in others, string up the paedophile from the nearest lamppost

and also the suspicion, Ray. She must have known. They must have known

I think that's the guilt part, the grieving process that we talked about

Yes, yes, yes. Denial, anger, yeah, yeah, yeah. And people, it's sad that people

that have got absolutely no connection and no knowledge of that crime being committed

have to carry that kind of guilt that they will think that people are thinking that about them

And, you know, it's just really poor. It's really sad. But anyway, there are no winners in these crimes, are there, James

There are no winners. There are not, but there are heroes. And that's you

So thank you for that. And thank you for making us aware of some of the things

that we would need to have witnessed what you've witnessed to properly understand

And look, hey, I mean, there it is. I haven't done it for years

but some nice lads from the Northeast who did this for the most noble of reasons

and were a lot more careful than some of the people doing it now

But I had never really thought about the implications of the innocent family members

the innocent, the collateral damage. to abuse. The people who knew nothing of it

but are intrinsically tied to the people who have done it. And there it is

Good Lord, Ray. I mean, crikey, I say it a lot, but some days I just can't believe

the calls that we take on the programme. The ability to unpack

really difficult and complicated topics and make everybody listening, myself included, sort of just think about things

in a new and helpful and important way. It's 10 to 12

I think that I might play you some of that original call

that I couldn't quite believe when we took it back in 2024 from Margaret

who was right there in the front line and more specific, in fact, to the allegations

that are being levelled at Thomas Markle, at Meghan Markle's father, the child sex abuse element of it

and what it feels like, what it sounds like to have that hand grenade go off

that Ray and I have just been talking about metaphorically in the middle of your own life

It's 11.51. James O'Brien on LBC. 11.53 is the time. Some extraordinary messages coming into the programme as well

Obviously, I'm not going to say any names, regardless of whether or not you've asked me to

I mean, again, it's everywhere. Do not say my name. My wife's parents allowed and excused a known paedophile family member to abuse not just my wife as a child

but also her brother, her older sister, and a cousin. The family member was jailed in Germany for child abuse, came back to England

and when the older sister told her parents that he was doing things to her, they punished her

This was not uncommon. And please God, it is now, but I've got no way of knowing

I mean, it's a gut reaction, isn't it? It's a defense mechanism. It's not true. It's a hell of a lot easier to process than my entire life as I know it is over. When my wife told a schoolteacher during sex education classes at school, the school called in the parents who told the school that she had a vivid imagination

it wasn't till she was in secondary school that teachers acted on what they were told

and my wife's parents couldn't argue about it they claimed they had no idea what this guy was like

the school went to the police but her parents didn't allow the police to talk to the children

the abuser moved away and apparently went to prison later 20 plus years later my wife has

finally accepted the damage that her parents have done and keep doing by brushing everything off she

has finally cut off all ties with her parents and i said no names but that's from someone

who gets in touch with me a lot someone i've met and uh i mentioned that only because it just drives

home that point about the ordinariness of these people and that danger the danger of thinking i

always think of my teacher at prep school you know he was the coach of the rugby team and the coach

with a football team. We all wanted to be, you know, in his good books

And the idea, I always use the child catcher in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang as the cliched idea

of what they actually look like. But, of course, they don't. And there's another example

11.55 is the time. I'm just waiting for a caller. Obviously, we have to be a little bit careful

on topics like this. So that's why I haven't played out the clip

of Margaret from 2024. so we're in the lap of the gods really we'll see how things pan out but um but i think we're okay

now to talk to steve who's in birmingham steve what made you pick up the phone uh just tell you

about my experience james um i had my best friend um i lost touch with him um he just disappeared

off the off the grid if you like yeah and uh i was at work one day my wife found me up to tell me

that his wife had been in touch. This was like three years later

His wife had been in touch. He was coming out of prison because he'd been arrested for child pornography

He went to prison. And that's why he'd been off the grid. And he told her that he was going to contact

some of his old friends and get in touch with us. Told he's by now estranged his ex-wife by now

Yeah, yeah, by now, yeah. So you just thought he emigrated? What's happened there

He's just gone. He's just turned. His phone number's not working anymore. Yeah, no answers to his phone, just gone off the grid

Nothing, you know. And then, lo and behold, his wife phoned us up and told us, like, you know

he wants to get in touch with his old friends. And if he had a phone, me, I probably would have gone

having been sitting in a pub with someone who had been done for child porn

Because you wouldn't have known. Wouldn't have known, mate. Flipping, eh? And we now can no longer look at our wedding photos

because guess what? He's the best man on the wedding photos. Good grief. Good grief

So when these people say, you must have known, no way, no way, mate, no way

So, I mean, I nearly asked that question, you know, and I stopped myself because of the conversation I had with Ray

I nearly said, were you really shocked? I mean, was there a little bit of you that sort of went

but that's part of the danger, isn't it? That's actually us reassuring ourselves that we would be able to sniff this stuff out

We'd be able to spot it. Whereas, of course, the reason why they succeed is because you can't

So you've had no contact with him since. at all no no i don't if i wouldn't i mean contact you when i found out you could have

one of one i'd stopped being upset yes i was very upset of course you could knock me you could knock

me down with a feather i i no idea whatsoever so you know in some ways that's the most important

point of all isn't it and you don't want to go through your life like kev mentioned thinking

that there could be one around every corner but then ray offers up the corollary to that everyone's

going to respond differently to their experiences. But there's, you know, having

personal experience of it doesn't mean it's happening more than it was before you

had personal experience of it. But it means that you begin to doubt your own

abilities. And it's not just that. It's not just that. It's the fact that he's been around

your kids. I hadn't thought of that. You know. And then you start thinking, well, what's

he been, what was he, what was he thinking? Not what was he doing, what was he thinking

you don't have to answer this question but did you have a conversation with your own children no

no I don't even know about it you weren't worried I mean there hadn't been enough contact or anything

not in I don't want to go there but there it is

you're the kind of man saying listen don't ever think that it couldn't happen to you

don't ever think that it couldn't happen in your world exactly that's what I wanted to say

well thank you for saying it And I mean, crikey, there it is, you know, that explosion in a life and that sense of, I don't know quite what it is

I suppose to be that kind of abuser, you have to have a warped sense of justification or a warped sense of that message

I mentioned to you earlier from someone who got in touch long before Meghan Markle's comments today came out

The point that they've made also about predators grooming entire communities before they groom direct victims

But a really powerful point about abusers. Predators, they don't accept no for an answer in all kinds of situations

The idea that, you know, somebody who just, well, just that phrase there, they don't accept

I don't know if predators are ever easy to spot, but I wonder whether once you know what to look for, you become better at recognizing signs, not guarantees, but signs and indications of what somebody else may be hiding

People who are unable to accept no for an answer in all kinds of situations, not just sexual situations, but all kinds of situations

It's a thought. I think it's fair to say you will probably welcome the news that we will talk about something a lot easier in the final hour that we get to spend together this week

Oh, unless, of course, you listen to the podcast, which is a lovely, lovely, lovely listen

It's like butter for the ears. James O'Brien on LBC. Four minutes after 12 is the time

I am going to stay with this for a little bit longer, I think. Well, I mean, it's just respectful to people who have rung in or got in touch or texted, like this messenger

I worked on the paedophile unit in the Met for eight years. I mean, of all the jobs you know you couldn't do, often it's a physical issue

Or sometimes perhaps you worry that you wouldn't have the correct courage to do it

I don't know what kind of mental strength you'd need to do this job. I really don and I don think I got it I worked on the paedophile unit in the Met for 8 years in various roles as an investigator in surveillance and intelligence development I worked on some very high cases in the noughties

Regardless of a person's place in society, it would be wholly unhelpful to have had someone of Meghan's profile

saying something publicly, inevitably undermining potentially an investigation. Idiots like Daily Mail commentators don't realise

that it can cause difficulties in evidence retrieval but also scare off victims and witnesses from speaking with us

They'd be too worried to have the press knocking on their door or their name known. That was 20-odd years ago

when we didn't have the proliferation of social media. Megan has obviously done the right thing by saying nothing

Excuse me. But because she said, I just, oh, lordy. That was an entirely unavoidable cough on my part

I think I literally just swallowed a fly live in the radio studio

You'll be able to check on YouTube, I suppose, if you're a massive weirdo, but that has never happened to me before

That was 20-odd years ago when we didn't have the proliferation of social media

Megan has done the right thing, but because she sells copy, she sadly has to endure this continual treatment

I can't call her. I'm training from half 11, teaching the safeguarding aspect

of some of the stuff that you're talking about. and I said I wouldn't name names

so I won't, probably a mistake you know, when we go low

when they go low, we go high but I think I can I'll share some headlines with you

without telling you who wrote them but no prizes for guessing which newspaper they're in

Meghan's father's heartbreaking new move should be playing on her conscience where's the Duchess's little act of love for him

asked one Daily Mail columnist why the debacle surrounding Meghan's father would never have happened if Diana was still alive

right so another Daily Mail columnist not now obviously six years ago

eight years ago the same year in fact that Meghan had just been made aware of the fact

that her father was the subject of allegations hideous allegations and bringing Harry's mum into it

as well and another one same paper it's not Meghan's hypocrisy over her

father that gets me Right, so this columnist, it's the pity of it all

And that point, of course, that David was making there with his eight years of experience on the paedophile squad

paedophile unit, was that she absolutely had to stay silent. Josephine's in Reading

Josephine, what made you pick up the phone? Hi. Hello. Yeah, it's not concerning a relative

but a lodger that I had living in my house for about 18 months, two years

Oh, God. And he was a friend of my daughter's, who at this stage were late teens, early twenties

And so I'd known him for quite a long time, kind of, you know, coming to the house and so on

And so when they moved out, he asked if he could rent a room in my house

So I was delighted. And I was very fond of him. So you'd known him growing up

I mean, you knew him, knew him. Yeah, yeah. Not actually growing up, probably from about 16 onwards

They made sort of friends, you know, around the streets, the way kids do

But no, he was a very nice kid. I was very fond of him

And he was fond of them, you know, my daughters. So when he asked if he could move in, he needed somewhere to live

I was happy, a bit of extra money coming in. and the girls had moved out

And then after this period of time, everything went fine. He was settled in really nicely into the household

And then one morning about, you know, six, seven o'clock in the morning

we got hammering on the door and there was the police. Your house

Yeah. He wasn't in. And, I mean, he had a lot of friends around the town

and I just assumed he was staying over with someone. So they came in and asked if I knew where he was

and I hadn't any idea. And it was obviously very serious. So I was sort of laughing, joking

you know, saying, oh God, what's he been up to? And I assumed it was, I don't know

something like robbery or something like that. But they wouldn't tell me

So I just got kind of anxious and began to think maybe something along those lines

Anyway, they took away his computers and I don't know what else

but they just went into his room and took the... They told you what they were looking for or not

No. No, okay. No, they just said they had to take his computer. They couldn't... I don't know

I mean, I don't know if it's normal practice to talk to people

you know, keep them apprised of what's going on but I had no idea

You're just a landlady in their eyes, aren't you, really? Yeah, yeah, yeah

But still, they obviously had to have permission to go into his room and take his stuff

I couldn't get hold of him. As soon as they'd gone, I tried to phone him but I couldn't to find out what was going on

Anyway, I don't remember now, it was quite a few years ago, how I found out, but I think the police

probably coming back and talking to me again asking me for more information about his lifestyle

and his friends and his movements and so on. And I think I pieced it together

Anyway, he was on bail, so he was never imprisoned as far as I know

And then it came to the point that he started phoning me. I hadn't spoken to him since this happened

And initially, by this stage, I kind of knew it was on the streets, you know, what was going on

It was possession of child sex abuse images. Yeah. Right. Yeah. But no activity, if you know what I mean

I do, yes. Yeah. So I was absolutely torn because I felt desperately upset about the whole thing

but very confused. Of course. You know, the initial feeling is kind of disgust

And then compassion, I suppose, a whole mixture of different things. Yeah

because he's still the person that you liked yeah and yet he's done this hideous

he's apparently done this hideous thing yeah but again just having images

it's such a bizarre phrase really isn't it what could it possibly

consist of you've got no idea and so I didn't want to condemn

anyway he kept phoning me and wanting to talk to me I think I was kind of substitute mum for him

at that point and eventually my daughters wouldn't have anything to do with him at all

they were just horrified were they cross with you? no, no I meant for contact

not for having him in the house but for keeping contact I don't think so

a lot of discussion went on one in particular saying God mum I don know how you can I just don know how you can but I did go and see him i went to visit him um and yeah because i just felt so sorry for him because his all his friendship group had gone

his family wouldn't have anything to do with him he was living on his own he was a freelance um

worker anyway who worked alone so he was just totally isolated and desperately guilty and

remorseful and just tragic in the extreme. And he kept assuring me, assuring me, assuring me

crying down the phone, I never did anything. I never did anything. I wouldn't do anything

And you must know that. Yes, actually, I do. But you have these feelings that are in you

What can you do? What can you do? You have to fight them. And it's a tragic condition to be

born with or to be conditioned into or whatever. I've read another article recently about the wife of a man who had gone through exactly

what you describe and chosen to stand by him because it wasn't about arousal or anything

like that. It was almost a sort of mental breakdown where you were just pursuing ever more sick images

on the internet in pursuit of some weird kind of dopamine. It's an addiction

yeah that's what this piece made yeah yeah did you maintain contact or did you sort of did it

because i mean i found it so emotionally um exhausting draining yes exhausting because i

didn't i didn't know how to cope with it because society i think at that point particularly there

was just such disgust and revulsion and rage in the air yeah you know they're revolting disgusting

people, as you said right at the introduction, some people think they should string

them up. And there's this little boy who's very, very young whose life is over

effectively. I mean, you are. I mean, most people who fit the description

that I'm about to apply to you deny it, but you're clearly a very

compassionate person. Probably too much. My daughter certainly thought so. That is what Christianity

teaches us and other religions teaches to be more like you than the opposite

True, and I wish that our society, in terms of the sophistication and complexity of the law

made provision for people who recognise that they have this propensity, it's in them

and please help me to protect society from me. Do you know, amazingly

given that I was talking about Margaret in Catterick at the beginning of this conversation

She's been back in touch actually just to say that if we want to play out that clip of what she went through when she discovered that her husband had a cache of images like these, then we can play it out

But I also took a call a few years ago from that man, the man you've just described, the man who is a paedophile but has never acted on it and can't really find any help in keeping himself out of the behavior that he is drawn to

Mm-hmm. And if it has established itself, which it obviously did in my lodger's case, that he'd succumbed to it at least to that extent, then the addictive element of the dopamine hit is a very, very real added burden

you know you have these desires which are illegal and immoral and wrong coupled with the fact that

you've got this addiction yeah um i mean yeah i don't know how anyone could not feel compassion

to be honest well i mean i i am aware that a lot of people don't i'm not quite sure where i sit on

this spectrum yet because i've never been presented with what you were presented with so so you don't

know how you're going to handle it in until you find yourself in this in the situation that you

describe and of course I would remind not you Joe I'm sure you've been over this in your own mind a

million times but every child image is a victim you know if these are images of children being

abused then they are not victimless crimes I appreciate there is a distinction to be drawn

between viewing and abusing, but I also understand why for some people

that distinction can sometimes seem moot. Thank you. Crikey. And Margaret also mentioned when she rang in

how impressed, if that's the right word to use. She commended, that's a better word

all of the people who phoned in to discuss this for simply having the bravery to do so

I think we can happily add you to that list, Josephine. 17 minutes after 12 is the time

I may carry on, actually. We've got a few bits and bobs to get through before 1 o'clock today

And if people have rung in on a subject like this, then I'm sure you understand why I am a little bit reluctant to do the usual

Oh, well, we haven't got time for this anymore. Apologies to so-and-so and so

I don't think I can do that today. You understand, right? Yeah, of course you do

It's 12.17. James O'Brien on LBC 14 minutes after 12 is the time

and you are listening to James O'Brien on LBC on a much lighter note from the conversation

that we're continuing with thank you to everyone who got in touch advising me to swallow a spider

are you familiar with that children's rhyme? I think I may have swallowed a fly

about 10-15 minutes ago and of course what you do if you swallow

you're supposed to swallow a spider and then it goes on and on and on and on

and I can't really remember all of the details, but I don't think we can turn away from this conversation for reasons I'm sure

I don't need to explain to you. If you are just joining us, an extraordinary story has broken while

we have been on air. It involves allegations reported in The Sun today that Meghan Markle's

father, the Duchess of Sussex's estranged father, is being investigated over a huge stash of child

sex abuse images after being reported to police by his own son. Daily Mail responded by offering

him an opportunity to make her a big, big public denial. The Daily Mail historically

had been a great, great friend of Thomas Markle with columnists queuing up to defend him and

of course, attack Meghan Markle for being so heartless and cruel in her refusal to have

anything to do with him. And it is Meghan Markle or the Duchess of Sussex who has revealed today

that she was made aware in 2018 of hideous allegations being levelled against her father

and was assured that they were being investigated. And she added, I hope it can now be understood

that despite certain media publications' distortion over the years, any distance from my father and my choice to not allow him

to have contact with her children was for one reason, to protect them

Cue precisely no conscience examination from the three people responsible for the headlines that I read you a moment ago

all from the same newspaper, all on the same subject. and all queuing up to attack this woman who was clearly going through hell

I think 2018 might have been the year in which she subsequently revealed she was enduring suicidal ideation as well But for one male columnist Meghan father heartbreaking new move should be playing on her conscience

Where's the Duchess's little act of love for him? For another, why the debacle surrounding Meghan's father

would never have happened if Diana was still alive? And another, it's not Meghan's hypocrisy over her father that gets me

it's the pity of it all. None of them, though, hideous though those comments are

qualify as the most ridiculous columnist on that newspaper. I don't think there are any prizes for knowing to whom that honour falls

And hopefully, there'll be a little bit of time to give you the latest update on that

What would we call it? Sort of mental decline, I suppose, before close of play today

But we have more important things to do. Bob is in Harlow. Bob, what made you pick up the phone

Hello, James. Nice to speak to you. My call is generally about how it affects people around in the family

Specifically me, but obviously it's okay with people as well. I'm the youngest of three brothers

And I was very close to my middle brother for most of my life, musical and all that

My older brother was never really involved in much. But when my father went into a care home sort of 12 years ago

we used to go up there, the whole family would go up there and we'd play music. And my older brother started to join in, so I was getting closer to him. Right

And then a family rift meant that my middle brother moved away. So I was kind of left thinking I can build a relationship with my older brother

Okay. And it was working. We received the news that his wife had breast cancer, which was obviously devastating

And we were trying to deal with it. And then about a week later, I got a phone call from him on one Saturday night after we'd seen him on the Saturday

And he seemed a bit down. And he said the police had been around

When he eventually got through to me, he said the police had been around. I said, well, what for? and he put the phone down on me, he rung back again

and I'm thinking it's something to do with his wife, you know I don't know why the police are coming around but initially

it was something to do with his wife, breast cancer and then he said I've been downloading things

and I said, what things? Not a clue what things? And he said, porn

and I was like, okay, well, I think this happens all the time, it's quite normal, you know

and then he said, and worse and that's it, that's when the bottom dropped out of

my life and everybody around he said, children and it's a bit of a blur after that if i'm honest with you because my wife i couldn't i couldn't tell

my wife my daughters were with me they're grown up yeah and obviously we had to go around there

um and the worst thing is we had to take my elderly mum around there as well

to try and explain to her and we couldn't tell her because i couldn't face it and we got around

there and why did you have to go around there well because i don't know i'm just being killed i'm

I'm just confused. I'm not having a go. Well, because my sister had cancer

the fallout with her and my nephew. Oh, of course you had to go around there

Sorry, mate. Yeah, it's a bit of a blur for me, and I'm only listening to you tell the story

Yeah. Trust me, I didn't want to go around there. No, of course you didn't. I'm a grandfather as well

I'm a part of my grandfather. So when we got around there, bless my wife and my two grown-up daughters

I couldn't get out of the car. I was wrecked. Have you told them by this point

Yeah, yeah, they knew now, because eventually I got it out. They took over. They went in there

They basically coerced him in to explain. He was almost, I don't know

Denial? No, no, not in denial. He was almost quite open and happy

that it was finally out in the open. Okay, right. So they coerced everything out of him

Yeah. And I went in in the end, and I just couldn't really speak

And in the end, when I was walking away, he said to me, don't abandon me. And I said, look, I'll support you any way I can

and unfortunately the only way I can support him is by having no contact with him

really because I can't deal with it of course you can't he did ask for a meet up

a few weeks later where he wanted to explain I really didn't want to go to

because I didn't know what he could say and we did meet in a pub and I was a nervous wreck

because naturally for me I should kill him that's how I felt because things like that to anybody who's decent

are just disgusting and unexplainable so I did meet up with him

and he tried to explain things by almost turning it around on these videos, they know what they're doing

and that was it, that was my point I said I can't do this and I walked away

and had no contact with me after that but there was obviously the fallout with my sister-in-law

because we almost had an argument about things because she was kind of standing by him

which at the time I didn't understand but now I do because her whole world was falling apart

she had breast cancer she had to protect her son and keep a roof over their head

So I understood that, but it caused a big rift. But my mum was a massive fallout

because she almost instantly went into the start of dementia. Couldn't understand it, went into denial

forgot about things and was constantly asking me, I hope you can make things up with Tim, what happened

And I didn't want to tell her. Oh, mate, this is awful for you, though

I mean, no one's suggesting for a minute that the big victims here are not the children in the images

No one, everybody knows that. But this is the point that Ray was making, isn't it

And he spent a lot of his career working in these kind of crimes and the collateral damage we never talk about

I have no idea how he can do that. Obviously, it's got to be done

But the fallout for me, I've never had any mental issues or any nervous issues or anything like that. Sure

But I was in and out of London every day on a motorbike. And when you're on a motorbike, you only have a crash helmet and no radio

That's when you do your thinking. And instantly, back at work after that weekend, I didn't know who I was

I didn't know what I was doing. I found myself looking at children walking along with their parents

And I was crying in a crash helmet. Oh, boy. Because the images that are in my head, which I couldn't get out

And do you know the worst of it, James? No, I don't. I don't

I was dealing with my granddaughter at the time, and I'm changing her nappies

Yeah. And the thing is, it does to you. It makes you question things, which I've never even thought about before

I know you haven't, and it means nothing. Do you know what it's like? It's just like sometimes when you're standing on a train platform

and the train's coming in and it crosses your mind that you might jump under it. It's just a weird thing that pops into your head because of other stuff

You can't get it out. You want to bang your head on the wall

You've never thought about these things before. Of course you haven't. And suddenly it's there

And then my mum got worse and worse, and I was a sole carer for my mum

because I couldn't deal with him. My other brother had moved away

and I had power of attorney with my mum financially. She was getting worse and worse

I had to deal with everything. And my middle brother was a massive support for me

but obviously he was a long way away. of course then mum died and we had the funeral

and I had to deal with that myself as well did your brother come to the funeral

well yes he had to really what were you going to do, knock him out at the door of the church

my only contact with him was once a year happy birthday and his name, that was it

nothing else and that was it and it started because of my mum but obviously it carries on

and that was the contact and then when mum died obviously he had to be involved financially

or kept in the loop anyway. And eventually... when she died and I was making funeral arrangements

he asked whether he could come, to which I said, of course, but you've got to understand, due to my mum's illness

she told most of the members of the family what happened. So I said to him, everybody there knows your situation

but he still insisted on coming. And that was the last time I saw him

But, you know, things like this phone in today has just brought me all back

this is the way things were affected like that. Yeah, of course it has. And I think it's cathartic to talk about

I hope so. I really do hope so. I was going to ask that, actually, because it's got to be

I mean, you know the old phrase, better out than in, isn't it? It's got to be, because otherwise it curdles inside you

and it poisons you and you can't process it. Have you ever spoken to anyone yourself

Have you ever had any counselling or any help with this? No, not counselling

I'm very close with my family and my girls and my wife are fantastic

You can get it all out with them. You don't have to because that's so important

I did have a very good friend at the time who we spoke about things

He was a great... I'm not friends with him anymore for some reason. No, but he was very supportive at the time

So it did help, and it gets you through it. Yes, it does. I think that's so important

The devastation that he did to the family is like a grenade. It just blew the family apart

And yet all along, it's almost like he didn't think he'd done anything wrong

or tried to blame other factors. There it is. and that's why, you know

this has gone in a direction I wasn't fully expecting, this whole conversation

not just the chat with you, but this idea that the phrase keeps coming back around again

The collateral damage is absolutely immense. It's huge. You are an incredible man

I don't know whether you realise that or not or whether you're good at taking compliments. That's what my girls tell me

Well, your girls, you listen to it, obviously not. Let's not get carried away

No, no, no, but they're the incredible ones. They really are. But those burdens you were carrying

they're all at the same time. There must have been moments where you wondered whether you were going to be able to shoulder them

to carry on the shoulder again. Yeah, there were many moments. Time heals a little bit

but things like this do bring it back, but for the right reason, obviously. Yeah, exactly. And Meghan being in the public eye

and not being able to explain things must be just awful. It doesn't bear thinking about it, does it

No, it doesn't bear thinking about it. It really doesn't. Cheers, Bob. No problem

Well, there you go. Have a great weekend with your girls, hopefully. You'll be seeing the grandchildren this weekend

I'm going to give the Samaritans number because some of the issues that we've touched upon may be affecting people listening for a whole variety of reasons

116123. Worth making a donation to them as well, remember, because they struggle to keep up with the demand for their services

But the plan is for there always to be someone at the end of the phone if you need to talk to someone

And that's a point that Bob made. really so powerfully it doesn't actually matter whether it's a mate or a family member a child or

a partner if you can talk to someone about this stuff then it it just you know we've done cliches

galore aren't we better out than in a problem shared is a problem halved and and sometimes

professionals would be the best people to talk to but not always it is sometimes just important that

you do not carry this stuff alone because i'm not sure many people could or can or should

12.32, Matt Hewitt has your headlines James O'Brien on LBC 12.36 is the time

I was talking to Bob a moment ago I was searching for that phrase, I couldn't find it

intrusive thoughts is what he was describing which can happen to anybody if you have OCD, obsession or compulsive disorder

the intrusive thoughts can be utterly unbearable they sort of reach a point where you are absolutely convinced

that you are either about to or have already done something unthinkable

when you haven't almost impossible to convey the horrors of OCD. But that's what he was describing

They are just, to use a word that is wholly inadequate, but they are just intrusive thoughts

which is why I drew the parallel with the trains at the platform

But God, I don't know if we'll ever hear anyone explain the impact of having something like this happen in your own family

on the entirely innocent family members. All family members are entirely innocent

except the culprit, don't get me wrong, but our natural sympathy, concern

goes out to the victims of child sex abuse, whether they are the people in the family

or whether they are people in photographs and films that your family member has watched

Of course it does, but it's not a finite resource, sympathy. There is plenty of room to also have sympathy for people whose lives have been completely

turned upside down. And I didn't know that that's where the conversation was going to go today. But

I fully understand where it has. Because what is Meghan Markle, if not a completely innocent

more than a bystander, participant in an unfolding story, albeit one in which her father

denies all allegations being leveled against him by her brother. In this case, Thomas Markle Jr.

claiming to have found a stash of images belonging to their father, Thomas Markle Sr., at his former home in the Philippines

And the Duchess of Sussex obviously deciding that this is a moment

in which to reveal that they were told in 2018 of apparently similar

presumably similar allegations, And that's why she elected to keep her father at arm's length

which of course hasn't stopped the world and his wife, in my profession, queuing up to attack her

Trigger warnings. I know a lot of people mock them, but they are necessary because a lot of people

who've just turned on the radio might be somewhat hijacked or ambushed by the content of the conversation that we having And that is the conversation that we having questions thrown up by the allegations being levelled at Thomas Markle Senior and the revelation by his daughter the Duchess of Sussex

that this isn't the first time that such allegations have come to her attention

Jenny's in Wandsworth. Jenny, what would you like to say? I am. Hello

I've got a story to tell, a real-life story to tell. It's not my personal story, but I've been very close to the person

So when we were in secondary school, the girl that was very good in school, very, very skinny

come to tell me a few years later when we were in college that her father

her father used to rape her from the age of four to 12

And her mom would stand at the door to make sure she couldn't run away

Safe to say, all her family's basically messed up, every single one of them

She's a functioning adult. She's got a very good job. but her herself is she's like you talk to a robot she's unemotional can't process emotions becomes

erratic very angry very quickly can't really hold on to relationships i remember when i'd see her

after knowing that it was it was so it was like she didn't she didn't care her way her mannerisms

i'd look at her and just try to work out how how can you function like this do you mean the lights

were on but there was nobody home sort of thing or or like no emotional connection with anybody

or she was living in a kind of zombie-like state or or what what do you mean she wasn't i didn't

understand how she could go out how can you go out allowing this thinking that this is okay

but in me saying that actually um i've got a story closer to home um something similar happened to me

growing up, but not to her extent. And then now that I look at my mother, I think the same thing

But it's almost something that they just put to one side so long as they can keep a man

They're willing to sacrifice their children because that's what society tells them

The most sacred thing they will ever have is a man and they don't know how to live without one

So they're willing to sacrifice children or a child so long as they can keep a man

and then eventually relationships break down sadly but i think my friend's one is just a

terrible story because it completely destroyed her as a person and there's no the authorities

never got involved in any of this because of the culture they never spoke about it when she did she

was older so she had to divorce quote-unquote the family and she has her own life she's changed her

name stays away from everything um but she couldn't do anything she was alone no one was

going to have her back no one's going to say is he still alive but man no he's dead thankfully

he he thought that's it isn't it i mean it is it's it bob touched on this it's like a it's like a

it's like a surgical amputation almost of of your family because if if you know there's the abuser

and then there are the in this case the facilitator you can't continue any sort of relationship with

them it's impossible to do so and she all the therapy in the world is is is not going to bring

back what she had taken from her is it when it said that a child that's in the book that i read

it said that the best way to destroy a human is um csa it that's how you destroy a child for a

person forever do a child at childhood age then when you're an adult you're completely destroyed

even if you've gone through a bunch of therapy and support i mean i don't doubt it for a minute

but i need to be a little bit more optimistic than the book that you read just just for didn't have

you know humanitarian reasons and oddly enough i'm going to play a little interview later with

a clinical practitioner at combat stress who is at great pains to make the point that you can

actually make a full recovery from not this sort of experience but from post-traumatic stress

disorder brought on by military service brought on by experiences um in in in the military so

i i don't know what a full recovery is because i'm not a clinician but whatever trauma you have

been through you have to acknowledge or believe that things can get better than they currently are

how much better um i uh i don't know thank you jenny um quite a lot of professionals listening

today and uh and here is another one hi james i spent time um in the police working in oxay the

online child sexual abuse and exploitation team in a police force and one memory that i've always

found hard to reconcile is that we had an obligation to check in on every defendant while

they were on bail regularly to ensure that they were okay and that they were not experiencing

mental health issues. It wasn't just a quick email, it was regular contact by phone and face

to face because suicide rates in defendants charged with charged sexual offences are typically high

The irony is that very little if any consideration was given to the well-being of police officers

whether those dealing with related offences or the daily and frequent experiences that being a

frontline officer involves it's absolutely right that we treat anyone charged with an offence in a

humane way um and if checking in on them regularly is deemed the right thing to do then so be it but

the piece that we were missing is the need to put as much importance on looking after the people

um their welfare their mental health who are looking after everyone else it's such a gap

and we see it in the significant increase in deaths by suicide of police officers

and frontline emergency service workers. I haven't said your name, but I would remind you that you should have put that

at the top of the message, otherwise I can sometimes miss it

I would be happy to have a broader discussion about this if it's ever helpful, but there is an organization called Silence Between Sirens

that has a look at precisely this question. a suicide prevention cause for the emergency services making it safe to speak up early and before breaking points are reached which is actually pertinent to the little interview that I going to play you shortly albeit that the military and the emergency

services are not exactly the same. You can imagine how some of the impacts and traumas of serving in

either can grow and ferment if left untreated, if left unaddressed. So that's one of the things

coming up next. James O'Brien on LBC. This week we have been finding out about the work of Combat

Stress, a charity set up over 100 years ago to provide specialist treatment and support for ex-service

personnel. And thanks to the charity Combat Stress I'm joined now by Dr Vicky Aldridge

the charity's principal clinical psychologist and clinical lead who is here to tell us more

I suppose we should begin Vicky by working out exactly what PTSD is what can cause it and what

we might be looking for specifically in an ex-member of the armed forces. Yes thank you so PTSD is a

mental health condition and it can occur after being exposed to a potentially traumatizing event

that was life-threatening or maybe threatened the safety of yourself or somebody else so when we

think about the military, what they do, we can see how many different types of experiences align

with that description. And whilst most assume that PTSD occurs as a result of frontline combat

we know that actually it can arise from many other different roles and aspects of military service

so medics and drone pilots, for example. And military service can expose people to

experiences that most civilians just will never encounter in their lifetime. And when PTSD occurs

it can have a huge impact on someone's ability to function and to live a meaningful life

I hope this isn't a stupid question but what should we or family members or loved ones be

looking for? How does PTSD oracle suffer? How does it present itself? Yeah well everyone's

experience is different and the reason for that is because ultimately no two traumas are the same

But there are some common signs. Commonly veterans might experience nightmares or flashbacks and that's where they feel like they're reliving that traumatic experience all over again

And those symptoms are distressing and they're often very frightening. So from an outside person looking in, you might notice that somebody appears distressed or anxious

Veterans will also frequently talk about feeling constantly on edge and experience difficulty in managing their emotions

So we often see that they struggle therefore in their relationships and how they interact with other people

And they might also avoid things, so they might avoid reminders of what happened

and we see many other difficulties running alongside PTSD too, such as alcohol misuse and depression

So often that leads veterans to withdraw from the people around them

and from their daily lives and their normal routines and roles. And actually for many they don't even recognise that those are mental health symptoms

and they simply feel that they're just struggling to cope with daily life

What sort of treatment does combat stress provide? And how bright is the light at the end of that tunnel

I mean, is full recovery possible? Do you know, there's a really persistent and actually unhelpful narrative

that PTSD is for life and that once it's there, those that are affected just simply have to learn to live with it

And that isn't just inaccurate. It's actually deeply discouraging because recovery is possible

In fact, over 70% of those that undertake our treatment recover, meaning they no longer meet the clinical criteria for a PTSD diagnosis

And that's something I think we need to be celebrating and shouting. Every veteran that comes to us will get a tailored, personalised treatment plan

tailored to their needs and their goals. And we deliver evidence-based treatment both online, in person

and we have the UK's only intensive treatment service that's exclusively for veterans

which means that recovery can happen in a matter of weeks. So for us, absolutely, recovery is possible

And that's a narrative that we really want to be pushing more. Some people listening to this are going to be astonished by that statistic, possibly even more astonished by this one

It can take up to 14 years. In fact, on average, it does take 14 years for veterans to reach out for help

Most of us can probably come up with some of the reasons why. Why do you think it takes so long

Unfortunately, we know that many veterans spend years trying to manage symptoms on their own before they seek support. But those that come to us will often talk about stigma and concerns about being seen as weak. And shame, it's a very silencing emotion. And for many veterans, they tell us that they feel ashamed about having mental health difficulties

and for some they just don't realise that what they're experiencing is treatable

but for whatever reason it's really vital that we encourage veterans to seek help

because we know if left untreated mental health difficulties can become more severe

and they can become more complex but what is encouraging is that whilst it can take 14 years for a veteran to reach out

recovery is still possible even after that 14 year period So it's never too late

Absolutely. Finally, Vicky, if a veteran or a family of a veteran is listening to us now and recognising some of the things you've described, wondering how they can get support, what should they do

If you're a veteran and you're struggling, please know that help is available and recovery is absolutely possible

They can visit combatstress to find out more about our services and how to access support and family members can also find advice and information there too We also got our free helpline that available 24 and that on 0800 138 1619

So my message would be please don't struggle alone and reach out to us

That's 0800 138 1619. Thank you to you, Dr Vicky Aldridge, for your time today

And thank you also to Combat Stress always for the incredible work that they do

If you need more information about the charity, just search it up

Head online and search for Combat Stress. 12.54 is the time. Really, really important charity doing great work

I got a text message at 12.08 today. It said, I hate you, but what a show

Which, I mean, how many words is that? One, two, three, four, five, six, seven

And some people need an entire column in the Daily Mail to make that point. But they've done it in seven single words

I'll leave you to work out what I'm talking about. I've got something nice to end the week with now

The full disclosure interview this week with Lisa Faulkner, just a lovely person

Sometimes sitting down with lovely people is a lovely thing to do

And she's got such a great story to tell. We begin the conversation with a recent diagnosis and successful treatment for breast cancer

So, you know, that's a sort of most recent appearance, if you like, in the news

But she's been there or thereabouts for most of her life. I didn't know the half of it, but I did know I would enjoy this chat

And spoiler alert, I really, really did. Here's just a little taste. And it goes back to the life changing experience, oddly, of being on Celebrity MasterChef

When MasterChef came up as, oh, do you want to do it? I thought, oh, well, I'll have a go

I was just dipping my toe in doing different things. And then and it was the first thing I could do after because I took a year off to have bills

And I didn't think I was going to. I like the show, but I had no idea I was going to win it

I had no idea. And I just cooked and I loved it

And every day I'd go back and I'd be on the phone to my mates going, they've asked me back

I'm through to the next round. And yeah, and then I won it

And I mean... This is another life-changing moment, really. Complete life-changing moment

Complete life-changing moment. Because suddenly you can see these other avenues opening up in front of you

where you can be on screen cooking. Yeah. Well, what happened was that I had a choice of doing a year in a soap and, or going and working in a kitchen

And I wanted to write a book. I wanted to write my cookery book recipes from my mother, from my daughter

So I said, no, I turned down my year in a soap

What did your agent say? They were really cross with me. I bet they were. They really, really hated me at that point

I bet they were. And I said, I'm going to go and work in a restaurant. I worked, went and did Tuesdays and Thursdays in different restaurants and just washed spinach, brushed mushrooms

Because you knew what was needed if you were going to actually make a go of this alongside other stuff, not instead of other stuff

But you couldn't do it in a kind of half-arsed fashion. I can't do anything half-arsed

No, I've sensed that. I've loved that. I sort of feel like everything is, I jump in and I sort of go, right, I'm fully immersed

and I loved cooking as a home cook but I I wanted to know more I wanted to learn about how to do

the roos and the you know sauces and the stocks and the brunoise chopping and now I don't do that

at all but you know I sort of had to go there before I could come back to being happy being me

as a cook it's a lovely chat that trust me um and and you will enjoy it also the recipe book's

really good i did the birth bourguignon last weekend um and and it was delicious i've had an

idea keith eleanor i've had an idea why don't we start doing clip of the week we could preface it

with and now live from norwich it's the clip of the week can we start anyone else keen why are you

looking at me like that look at them sheila that's my team your team don't look at them

you know i call that it's a mix sabotage sabotage you're right sabotage it's a curious mixture of

Disdain, disapproval and disgust. Do you know the origins of the word sabotage

No, I don't. It's so good. Go on then. Sabot, S-A-B-O-T, is French for clog, like a wooden clog

Oh, yes. And the workers in Paris printing works threw the clogs in the wheels to disable them because they were on strike

Look at that. Whoever knew that Keith is a clog in human form? so anyway if we do launch if i remember until monday when i've got a very very exciting

announcement to make for you uh if i remember until at least monday that we're going to start

doing clip of the week and the first ever clip of the week clip of the week clip of the week is this so he's over here i'm over here and i'm studying his body i've never studied the body of

a man before it's not my thing nothing wrong with it of course nothing i always proceeded by saying

nothing wrong, but it's never been my thing, to be honest with you

But I looked at his ass. And then I looked at his legs

And I said, his ass is like a pile of muscle. Then I looked at his legs

and I said, man, his feet are big. Man, his feet are big. If you missed any of today's show, you can listen

back on our free global player app or the lbc app where you can also stay up to date with all

the latest news videos and opinions you can listen to a range of podcasts including james o'brien

daily and of course full disclosure you can download the official lbc app for free from

your app store now ben kentish with you from for info tom swarbrick but now it's time for

james o'brien on lbc