Up next in 10
Former MP and MEP Ann Widdecombe was found dead at her home in Haytor on Dartmoor on Thursday after sustaining serious injuries. In a briefing on Tuesday, Head of Counter Terrorism Policing Laurence Taylor said it was clear a degree of "preparation and planning" went into the killing of the 78-year-old. Assistant Commissioner Taylor also revealed that police have a warrant to detain the murder suspect, a 28-year-old white male, for another seven days under the Terrorism Act. Iain Dale gets the latest from LBC's Bethany Dawson and hears our caller's opinions. #iaindale #reform #nigelfarage #robertjenrick #widdecombe #news #lbc LBC is the home of live debate around news and current affairs in the UK. Join in the conversation and listen at https://www.lbc.co.uk/ Sign up to LBC’s weekly newsletter here: https://l-bc.co/signup
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0:00
Bethany Dawson is here, LBC's political correspondent, to take us through, well, not just this announcement from the police today, but some of the political ramifications
0:10
Bethany, first of all, let's start with the police announcement. I mean, the only new thing was that they say that Anne Whittakin was deliberately targeted
0:20
And that was quite a big announcement. As you say, head of counterterrorism policing Lawrence Taylor said that it was clear a degree of preparation and planning went into the killing of 78-year-old Anne Whittacombe, calling it a targeted attack
0:36
It is clear that this was a targeted attack. We are still working to understand the extent of any planning or preparation and the motivation that sits behind that attack
0:50
and I do not want to comment further on this at this stage of our inquiries
0:57
Extensive searches have taken place at an address in Rotherham and scenes remain in place as that activity continues
1:04
We have also been granted a warrant of further detention which means the suspect can now be held for questioning
1:11
for up to seven days under the Terrorism Act. He remains under arrest on suspicion of commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism, as well as on suspicion of murder
1:27
Now, this entire awful incident has, of course, caused a lot of pain to those who knew and loved Anne Whittacombe, both from her political life and her stardom that followed
1:37
But the incident has also reignited discussions around MP safety, with reform saying that the government had failed Nigel Farage
1:46
The Reform UK Treasury spokesperson Robert Jenrick accused the government of a dereliction of duty over Nigel Farage's taxpayer-funded security, claiming it had previously been downgraded
2:01
The Home Secretary is the ultimate arbiter of what happens in the Home Office
2:06
She isn't powerless and no one would pretend so. Would she agree that it was unwise of the government
2:15
to heavily reduce the security offered to the member for Clacton, given all that we know about his particular danger
2:25
that is posed to him and to his family? Would she agree that, frankly, it shouldn't have taken the murder of Anne
2:33
for him to be offered a meeting with the committee and that many will conclude, perhaps unfairly, but nonetheless
2:43
that it is only because of the political views of the member for Clacton
2:47
that he is placed in this position. Now, the Home Office have said that Robert Jenrick's comments there
2:54
were categorically untrue, with a spokesperson adding that ministers are not involved in deciding MPs' security
3:01
Do you think the media has some responsibility here Because I understand that pictures of Anne Whittacombe house were shown I think it was on a television programme fairly recently
3:13
So, I mean, I'm not necessarily linking that to the fact that she was killed
3:20
possibly by the person that's in custody at the moment. But it could be that that turns out to be the case
3:28
And we all know what Keir Starmer's house looks like because there were pictures of his house, not all of it, but some of it
3:35
which some people might be able to recognise after the firebombing of the car outside
3:41
So I think sometimes we may have to take a little bit of responsibility
3:45
for actually keeping some aspects of MPs' lives private. Yeah, I think the media kind of needs to operate in a way
3:52
and I say this as a member of the mainstream media, that we need to operate in a way where we acknowledge that MPs' security
4:00
has changed vastly and is, you know, they are people in much more danger than they maybe were
4:08
10, 15, 20 years ago. And this is with extra precautions in place. Every MP is given a sort
4:16
of panic alarm that they carry. Many of them carry it on their lanyards in Parliament or on their
4:21
keys to quickly alert security services that something has gone wrong. It's not as though
4:27
they're sort of left to their own devices. But we also have to recognise that Anne Widdicombe was not an elected politician at the time that
4:36
she was killed. Now, she was doing speeches up and down the country for reform. She had been
4:41
I don't think she was still an official sort of frontbench spokesperson for them on justice
4:46
and immigration, but she had been fairly recently. So where do you draw the line? I mean, if, for
4:51
example, somebody who had been a politician starts getting death threats. Do the police
4:58
then automatically think, OK, well, we need to provide some sort of extra security? What
5:04
about celebrities? We've got all the stuff about Prince Harry and his family as well
5:09
It's very difficult to be definitive and say, well, this is where the line has to be drawn
5:14
And I think that is often why you hear sort of the reasoning that this is all decisions are taken by a case by case basis
5:23
I thought it was interesting that Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood in the House yesterday did say that they would be reviewing the sort of protections for MPs after they finish their time as an MP, after they finish their time in Parliament
5:36
exactly because of what you were just saying, you know, protections do exist for MPs
5:40
but it doesn't mean that they leave the public spotlight after they leave the House of Commons
5:46
Bethany, thank you very much. That's Bethany Dawson, LBC's political correspondent. Let's go to Denise, who's in Whitehaven. Hi, Denise
5:52
Hi, Ian. I am really sorry for the loss of your friend
5:56
Thank you. I didn't agree with any of your opinions or the way she delivered them
6:04
But what happened was absolutely beyond the pale But the reason I was ringing is because I think all the parties need to deal they need to stop the rhetoric they need to deal it down
6:22
Dial it down, you mean? What, in terms of their rhetoric? Yeah, yeah
6:26
Yeah. They're giving voices to people that should never be heard. All of them
6:35
Like who? well we've got the anti-immigration that blames everything on people are not white
6:43
um i've no idea why they went for ann like i say i've never agreed with anything she said but i've
6:50
agreed with her being able to say it and i'm disgusted beyond disgusted what happened to her
6:56
but everyone seems to be jumping on this bandwagon where you can say what you want
7:03
I think it's, I mean, on social media, basically you can. I mean, when you hear what Paula Sherriss said about the fact that Twitter or X or I don't know what it was called at the time, probably Twitter, that they refused to take seriously
7:16
Somebody had tweeted saying that she needed a bullet through her head
7:20
I mean, if that doesn't if that doesn't warrant further action, I don't know what does
7:25
So, yes, we control social media. You can't. That's the problem. You can't control it
7:32
You can abolish it. I mean, you can basically stop X operating in this country
7:37
but I don't think anybody would seriously suggest that that was warranted at the moment
7:43
And also, let's bear in mind that there are plenty of politicians
7:47
who don't want the kind of security that I think is now being suggested
7:52
As I said, I think last night, if you'd said to Anne Whittacombe..
7:56
She'd have run the marathon. Well, she would have said, No, I don't want a policeman standing outside my door 24 hours a day
8:02
Thank you very much. She was advised to get an electric gate in front of her property by a friend of hers
8:08
And she didn't want to because she wanted to live a normal life. And that's what everybody should be able to do
8:14
I know I didn't agree with everything she spoke about, but I do admire her
8:19
Yeah. And that was her unique appeal to people. And I've had so many messages over the past few days on social media directly as well from people like you
8:29
say, well, I didn't agree with much of what she said, but I respected her for being a conviction
8:34
politician and standing up for what she believed in, even if I thought what she believed in was
8:38
wrong. And I think we need more of that, don't you? I do. I do. But I don't think we've got
8:43
politicians like that anymore. Well, let's hope we can have a new breed of them over the next few
8:48
years. There are some good ones in the House of Commons at the moment. We mustn't get into this
8:52
idea that they're all rubbish. No, I don't think they're all the same. I don't. But to make a cheap
8:58
political point. I mean, there's 400 Labour MPs and none of them seem to
9:02
be good enough to take over from Keir Starmer so they've had to import another one. But that is a cheap point, which is not
9:08
worthy of me. We have also some people that are going on the racist rhetoric
9:14
and it's not helping this country at all. Yeah, well you see, that's
9:18
where I mean I do draw a line I will not have people on my programme who I think are extremists Because I mean yes Anne Widdicombe always said that she would engage with people who
9:31
hold views like this because you have to defeat them by the power of argument
9:36
You can't ban people from holding the views that they hold. And I mean, she does have a point
9:42
But do I want somebody in my studio spouting these kind of views
9:47
The answer is no, I don't. and I'm not going to have them
9:51
So let's move on to Richard, who's in Torton. Hello, Richard. Hi, Ian
9:56
I'm ringing in response to your first caller, Denise, who said that, you know, politicians need to dial back the rhetoric
10:04
which was a rather vague remark. And when you asked her to clarify, the first thing she said was
10:09
oh, you know, this anti-immigration rhetoric. And it seems to me that, you know
10:14
believing that immigration in this country is too high is a perfectly acceptable political view
10:22
And there seems to be, you know, a great push by progressives, politicians and others to shut that debate down
10:30
Whereas, in fact, most of the country thinks that immigration has been too high for a long time
10:36
It seems to me a perfectly acceptable political view that people get a lot of criticism for
10:45
And I think it relates to the issue of MP safety, particularly Nigel Farage
10:50
because on the one hand people say, yes, MPs shouldn't get all these threats
10:54
and they will reluctantly include Nigel Farage in that as well. Of course, Nigel Farage shouldn't get these threats either
11:02
But on the other hand, they go, well, his views are rather extreme. as almost as though, you know, to some extent he's bought it on himself
11:09
I just don't see that, you know, arguing that immigration in this country is too high is anyway extreme
11:17
No, I agree with you. But I mean, this is a bit of an incendiary debate
11:22
That doesn't mean to say we shouldn't have it. But I think politicians of all parties need to be careful of the language that they use
11:30
And I think there have been MPs on the right of politics who have used incendiary language from time to time, just as there are MPs on the left who've used incendiary language about Israel and Palestine
11:43
So, I mean, this is something that I think all politicians have got to consider
11:49
And also those of us that are in the public eye and active on social media
11:53
And I'm going to be completely honest here in that I know that I sometimes go over the top on social media because it's something you see somebody say something and you react very quickly and you kind of say something a little bit more extreme than you really mean to
12:08
And I nearly did that when I saw what Peter Tatchell had said about Anne Widdicom on Friday
12:12
But I didn't. I moderated what I said and did it in a very logical way
12:17
And I think people reacted well to that. And we've all got to try and do a little bit more of that and not react in a violent way
12:25
I don't mean violent physically, but in a violent way on social media, because it just drags the whole public discourse down
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