charge difference to them who is in charge because the state is so pervasive anywhere. exactly, it doesn't matter who is in charge, because it is not a democracy. sol who is in charge, because it is not a democracy. so i guess it doesn't matter to the ordinary man and woman. but there were excesses when chairman mao was running china, and i think that is why the law was changed, to try and stop a repeat of that, so only time will tell whether he behaves himself. shall we move onto oppressing matter, in the express, on page three, no less... clotted cream clots cornish fury at tea—time treat blunder... you just know where this is going. it is all about which order you put your cream and your charm on your scorn. now, you are from devon, so which is the correct way? the correct way, for everybody, who is cream and then jam. iwill everybody, who is cream and then jam. i will not have those people in cornwall telling me otherwise! basically there was a national trust

house who put on their facebook page a picture of the devon way of doing things and in cornwall they got lots of people very angry saying, it was wrong! and they put out a very good statement to say, we would like to sincerely apologise, the person who made this error has been marched back over the river. saying rest assured, your mothers are safe here! do you think it was a devonian interloper? i can't comment on what oui’ interloper? i can't comment on what our devon spies do, it would be inappropriate for me to do that! you are not from devon or cornwall but which way round do you do it? are not from devon or cornwall but which way round do you do mm are not from devon or cornwall but which way round do you do it? it has got to be jam first because if you think about it, you put the cream on and then try to put the jam on it, it doesn't work. you see, that's how idoit it doesn't work. you see, that's how i do it as well, from a purely practical reasons. but aesthetically it looks better because you have the nice... look at that beautiful...

that's probably why they've done that picture, because it shows the cream and the john, that picture, because it shows the cream and thejohn, but it's not the right way to do it. and what about butter? i am for as many things that will give you a heart attack in your food as possible. no butter. i don't ee, food as possible. no butter. i don't agree, you have to gild the lily, it has to be salted butter as well! shall we do that for the second half, can we get it? i think we should, can anyone send one in?! wouldn't that be wonderful?! if anybody had thought ahead. that is the papers for this hour. dave wooding and owen bennett will be back at half past 11 for another look at the papers. sergeant hamish macbeth lives in a sleepy place, lochdubh, in the highlands where you might think there's not much drama. but 33 books on, he's investigating yet another murder in death of an honest man.

yet, in mc beaton‘s novels, even when dastardly happenings are all around you, the pace of life in lochdubh, with its regular cast of characters never seems to change. these are crime stories that are written to be reassuring. welcome. what do you think hamish macbeth's secret is? ithink... what fascinates people is he's totally unambitious. and what i try to do, you see, i think of myself more as an escape artist than a writer, is give someone something

to take their mind off the troubles or a wet day or a journey. and it's based on a crofter that i still know up near buey, and he would say, "just fed the hens and i'm going to see my cousin in hong kong." and very laid—back. fascinating. yes, it is interesting. of course, he doesn't want to leave lochdubh, which is a lovely place, although terrible things keep happening. and he's terrified. inspector blair, who keeps interfering with him and his activities, is always a threat on the horizon but all he wants to do is stay with his own folk in the village and that's a very reassuring thing to readers, isn't it? yes, it is. it observes the unity, keeping it all in a small place, and justice seen to be done. i admit it's rather old—fashioned because it can't be high—tech. the forensic lab's usually off playing shinty or drunk. but it's reassuring to know that it will all come all right in the end. i like stories with happy endings. you do, clearly.

and there is also a great calm in the way that you write. there's no sense of hurry or frenzy, even when awful things are happening. there will be a moment of violence, we're not going to give away the plot because that would be a terrible thing to do, but there is a placid quality to the whole thing. that's really what you're aiming to do, isn't it? it is. comfort reading. when i had a hip operation in paris, i sent my sister up to whsmith on the rue de rivoli to buy as many agatha christies as she could put her hands on. because that is also... the between the wars detective stories which i love, it portrays a world, a small world, where there is always a squire, and there's the strawberries and the tennis parties. it was a world of the very small privileged few. of course. but there's also something about these stories that will remind some people, i suppose, of something like the father brown stories, where nothing much seems to happen. it's a very gentle, unfolding

of a story but it has a kind of... you know, simple elegance to it, just as a tale. thank you very much. people often think because it's very easy to read, it must be easy to write but i only do one draft, and i've a friend in paris who said, "you've got a very good literary background, "why don't you write something... "different?" he meant better, you know? i said but that's the best i can do. you can't cheat the reader. it's the very best i can do. if it comes out frivolous... you have to check you don't use the same word twice, and you lay it on layers. a lot of people do confuse good writing, powerful writing, emotionally charged writing with complexity, you know, with invention, with changes in form. you're you can do it like that if you want

but you can also do itjust by writing good, old, plain english. yes. also, an editor way back wondered why agatha raisin hadn't been published, for example, in this country. and i said they want the dark side, and i don't do dark. you know, i don't do torture. and anything with children being hurt, i run a mile. so, nobody gets electrodes and the ghoulies in my books, you know. maybe not, but they do get murdered. the title of this, death of an honest man, sort of gives it away. somebody is killed in the village. it's always someone who deserves to be killed. there's nothing worse than people who tell it like it is. i speak as i find which means they don't care about your feelings. when people say he tells it like it is, they usually mean he tells it like it isn't. yes, exactly! that's the truth, isn't it? absolutely.

you've got to get people to accept the absurd premise a bit like midsomer murders on television, where you have a village, and, indeed miss marple's village in christie, whom you mentioned, where every other day there is a murder. now, we know this doesn't happen. it just doesn't. it's fantasy. it's complete fantasy. there's been one murder in sutherland the past 100 years. i make up for it. yeah, you've certainly made up for it. now, what kind of guy is hamish macbeth? he is, as you say, unambitious. there he is, with his shock of ginger hair, he knows everybody in the village... oh, not ginger. red. right, red hair. and he, obviously, knows everybody in the village. what keeps him going? he loves the laid—back life. he is lazy. he's unambitious. he's intuitive. a lot of the highlanders have sort of rudimentary telepathy. you have to be polite inside as well as out. well, people talk about having extra

powers and, you know, all the rest of it, in the highlands, and stories about these things. do you believe there is something lurking about? instinctively they seem to know what you're thinking. it's rather unnerving. he has that quality and also just a general love of the land. geography shapes people, you see. they said would i ever move agatha raisin to the highlands? no. the other series, yes. it wouldn't fit in. it would be ridiculous. you obviously love the highlands. yes, my mother was highland. although we lived in glasgow, she used... she believed in fairies. she used to put out a dish of milk for the fairies. in glasgow? in glasgow. and the hedgehog drank it but we didn't like to destroy her illusions. well, she knew it was an illusion, presumably butjust kept it going. oh, no!

oh, no? oh, no! no, there's nothing madder than some type of highlander! you're writing about a world that you don't want to see go, and you don't want to destroy, you don't want to... have to experience too much turbulence. you just want it to be described, understood and absorbed. yes. and a bit of kindness. a little bit of decency underneath, which is considered old fashioned, except alexander mccall smith has brought it back into fashion. i read one of his isabel dalhousies and i thought, this is... and then i got addicted to them. yes, well, addiction seems to have happened to hamish macbeth. will he continue? will there be more? well, i'm contracted for two more. i tried to retire. i said to my agent, i want fun. and i went on a hebridean cruise, you know, the very expensive one? what a waste of money. everyone was so nice. there was no one i wanted to kill. yeah.

it would have been nicer if there'd been a murder, then you could have... not a murder, just someone obnoxious. i mean, the orient express was marvellous for obnoxiousness but there was no one there. they were just absolutely marvellous. waste of space, so i decided to go back to work. back, more writing? more writing. mc beaton, author of death of an honest man and 33 books featuring sergeant hamish macbeth, thank you very much. thank you very much indeed for asking me. we start to see some unsettled weather pushing in. where we saw some sunshine through the rain across the south—west of england it was quite as and if not quite mild. this area of low pressure will continue to bring outbreaks of rain

across england and wales primarily as we head on into monday. so, it will be a less cold start across england and wales because of the breeze, the cloud and rain. there could be a little bit of mist and fog first thing in scotland and northern ireland. strong winds touching aomph—somph across the south—west of england and into the channel islands. some showers just getting into northern ireland, otherwise much of northern ireland and most of scotland getting the best of the drier and brighter weather. a village of high pressure promises to build in across the country for tuesday, settling things down before this area of low pressure comes in on wednesday and thursday to bring a succession of weather fronts. on tuesday, thursday to bring a succession of weatherfronts. on tuesday, then, we still have the breeze, outbreaks of rain across the south—east. this will eventually clear away. and then apart from the odd shower it looks

like conditions will improve on tuesday afternoon thanks to that ridge of high pressure. it will feel quite pleasant in the strong march sunshine. but it is a short lived window of fine weather. notice the isobars become looser on wednesday, so the winds will be stronger, coming up from a southerly direction and feeding in a lot more cloud. starting off chilly in central and eastern areas. before the cloud sta rts eastern areas. before the cloud starts to build in. fairly strong southerly winds feeding in outbreaks of rainfor southerly winds feeding in outbreaks of rain for northern ireland and the irish seacoast. in the sunshine not feeling too bad. and then from thursday onwards it looks like it will become quite unsettled with outbreaks of rain. the winter starting to pick up and coming from an easterly direction so it looks like it could be cooling down towards the end of the week. this is bbc news.

the headlines at 11: the bbc understands traces of the nerve agent used to poison sergei and yulia scripal were found at the restaurant table where they ate. up to 500 patrons of the sites being investigated in salisbury have been told to wash their clothes and possessions. some say the advice should have come earlier. we have not taken the precaution you. —— yet. we are outraged to be honest, about the fact we only found out now. the chancellor says there's cause for economic optimism ahead of his spring statement on tuesday. china's congress approves the removal of term limits for its leader, paving the way for president xi to remain in powerfor life. also in the next hour: a box office blockbuster for black panther.