to discuss that, we're joined byjeff mcallister, a former white house correspondent, london bureau chief for time magazine, and a practising lawyer. as well as writing for portuguese publications, eunice goes is an academic in london, exploring the importance of ideas in politics. and back with us in the studio after weeks pounding sidewalks in the us presidential election, bbc presenter and foreign correspondent, clive myrie. good to have you back, clive. "we're a much better country than every single one of them". the cabinet minister gavin williamson's tiggerish patriotism was on display in a radio interview about vaccine approval. naked nationalism was on display across the channel. clement beaune, france's europe minister was blunt. "i want to tell our fishermen, our producers, the citizens, we will not accept a deal with bad terms". if the talks fail, getting those

vaccine—filled trucks over from the continent could become a bit slower. eunice, what do you make about all these rumbling noises? how seriously should we take the french threat to veto a ny should we take the french threat to veto any eu trade deal?” should we take the french threat to veto any eu trade deal? i think we should take that very, very seriously. because emmanuel macron in france is relishing the role of being the bad cop in the final stage of the brexit negotiations. in reality, france is not alone. old allies of great britain, denmark and the netherlands are also very concerned and ready to use their veto is, together with spain and italy over the issues of fisheries. the understanding in europe is it is actually a bad deal, no deal is better than a bad tail and that is the realisation of several member states and that is why the negotiations have been posed because

they don't want the eu to make any more concessions. the eu made considerable concessions particularly in the area of a level playing field. fisheries level playing field. fisheries level playing field. fisheries level playing field and arbitration issues. the understanding in several european capitals is, it is better not to sign a deal that will tie us up not to sign a deal that will tie us upfora not to sign a deal that will tie us up for a long period of time, let's say a decade. then deal and face a terrible 2021. that will force us to find a way back to the negotiating table find a way back to the negotiating ta ble after find a way back to the negotiating table after we have faced the cold of the no—deal brexit, so to trade under wto rules, we will then actually find an accommodation and the united kingdom, the expectation in many european capitals, the united kingdom will understand and come to realise there is a hard

trade—off between regulatory sovereignty on one hand and access to the single market of a50 million. 0n the question of fish, the interesting realisation of this week has been that other european countries have also strong cultures around the sea, around the fishing industry, although they represent quite small sections of their gdp. in britain we have come to the realisation and fishermen are coming to the realisation, most of the fish thatis to the realisation, most of the fish that is caught in british waters ends up on european tables, it is not consumed in the united kingdom. so british fishermen and scottish fishermen in particular will come to realise that yes, they might have access to their quota, so they no longer are sharing their quota with other european fishermen, but what is the good of that if they cannot export it but they will export at a

much higher price that no one is ready to pay for? that is if there is no deal. these are essentially the issues. jeff, picking up on what eunice was saying, it is very tempting that idea, the talks are allowed to collapse after a few months of difficulties that might make everybody a bit more amenable, a bit more willing to compromise because they have seen the alternative and the alternative would be too painful. how big a risk is it that kind of sentiment takes hold in the coming days?” is it that kind of sentiment takes hold in the coming days? i would be frightened of that kind of an icon. the id people become more rational with the face of trauma has not been borne out in recent politics in any country. london bookmakers are giving 80% odds for a deal, to be betting on rationality in these negotiations has never seen like a good result. but it is so obvious

that fishing, 0.1% of the british economy should be a tail wagging the dog, ao% of exports and 60% imports. it doesn't make any sense. while borisjohnson has it doesn't make any sense. while boris johnson has been it doesn't make any sense. while borisjohnson has been a leader in some sense, a head—banger of the brexit faction, labour says it will vote in favour of a reasonable deal, he probably can isolate the nigel farage brexiteers i get a majority if he has anything that will pass off as a reasonable deal. this could all be last—minute messing. i hope so. all be last—minute messing. i hope so. if there are queues of lorries stretching back ten miles and people cannot get food and medicine and all the things they have taken for granted for years, it could concentrate the mind. i know there are a lot of people who are anti—brexit who would like to see that. but i don't think it would be

a productive way to get negotiations in six months or a year. how much does borisjohnson need a deal?|j does borisjohnson need a deal?” think there is a sense among quite a few members of the parliamentary party that is the case with the europeans, that a bad deal is worse than no deal. and i think boris johnson would be relatively sanguine in bringing that home, as long as he can make it clear, as far as his supporters are concerned, that he did his best, he fought for britain. it was those damn europeans you want to do much, they wanted to smash our fishing industry. which, unlike what we have just heard, might not make any practical sense in terms of how important it is to the british economy but it is totemic in terms of the emotional relevance. they tried that with roast beef air and it blew up in their face? that is

true but fish is slightly different in this context because the french are involved and it is the european union. i remember the are involved and it is the european union. i rememberthe cold are involved and it is the european union. i remember the cold wars from the 705 and union. i remember the cold war5 from the 705 and all that kind of stuff. but i think it is fascinating, thi5 whole divide between the european union and britain, the months of di5cu55ion5 union and britain, the months of discussions that have taken place have borne down to two very important things that go to the heart of brexit and what brexit wa5 about and go to the heart of the point of the single market and the european union and the trading block. the first is the so—called level playing field. the idea of the uk want5 level playing field. the idea of the uk wants to take back control, which i5 uk wants to take back control, which is what brexit wa5 uk wants to take back control, which is what brexit was all about, and that the same time that might potentially mean it undercutting it5 rival5 on the continent. that goes to the heart of undercutting the leg5 to the heart of undercutting the legs of the single market. of the very point of the european union. it i5 very point of the european union. it is interesting we are in this last chance 5aloon, everyone is propping up chance 5aloon, everyone is propping up the ball and everyone is getting 5lightly drunk but time is really

running out. if there is no deal by the end of this week and beginning of next, will it be ratified by the 315t of december by all the european parliament? i don't think so. eunice, you lecture a lot on ideas in politics and you have this idea of sovereignty, the idea uk has to establish for its own voters, as well as the rest of the world that it is an independent, sovereign nation and on the other hand you have this concept of the free market, the ability for companies to freely throughout, whether in labour 01’ freely throughout, whether in labour or in goods, we know it doesn't work in service as yet, but let's leave that aside. are they irreconcilable as concepts? they are. you either have sovereignty and regulatory sovereignty, or you have a free trade area and you are trading with the world as freely as possible. the europeans have found full

sovereignty and that is the genius of european integration. the idea is you are pooling yourself, you are giving a bit of your sovereignty in exchange to being stronger when facing the outside world. so you create a single market, you pull your sovereignty but you have something to gain. there is that a cce pta nce something to gain. there is that acceptance that there isn't a trade—off and that trade—off is to your benefit. in britain, and essentially why brexit happen, there isa essentially why brexit happen, there is a very absolutist, purist view of sovereignty, which very interestingly, only the british are concerned with their sovereignty in relation to europe. because the british government, in particularly the conservative party, is not very concerned with losing sovereignty vis—a—vis the united states or with regard to trading with china or in the acceptance of having multinational corporations deciding their own tax policy. it is a very

selective approach to national sovereignty, but it has one that has dominated and shaped to british politics for the past a0 years also. and could well do for a0 years more perhaps. thank you. the uk has become the first country to authorise the use of a vaccine for coronavirus. having previously over—promised a world class test and trace system to identity those infected with the virus, the prime minister displayed some caution, warning of the "immense logistical challenges" involved in getting people vaccinated. jeff, is this time under promise? ye5, jeff, is this time under promise? yes, it is always better to under promi5e yes, it is always better to under promise and over deliver. it is also interesting that all of the vaccine u5e 5eem5 interesting that all of the vaccine u5e seems to be good. the trials, there are seven that have reached final stage trial5 there are seven that have reached final stage trials and they all seem to have remarkably high effective rate5

to have remarkably high effective rates and they are coming on relatively quickly. the manufacturing chain 5eem5 relatively quickly. the manufacturing chain seems to be prime. thi5 manufacturing chain seems to be prime. this is a fantastic 5ucce55 of international science and capitalism to produce these... and government corporation to get these teed up. the interesting part will be acceptance. if you look at the survey data in britain, about 70% say they will voluntarily take a vaccine, but that still leaves 30% out. the older people are willing to ta ke out. the older people are willing to take it, the younger people are more affected by the anti—vaccine crusades and internet conspiracy stuff, are less likely to take it. but the governments are prepared, the uk has bought multiple doses of vaccines, advanced purchases as have other european countries. they have up other european countries. they have up to six doses per person in major european countries already bought.

and now it is up to public information campaigns, which could be an opportunity for big pharma, which has been so reviled over the past years, the producers of price gouging and all sorts of social ills. now they have a true public health miracle, in some sense, cheap and probably very effective, something that can solve a big problem both economical and medical. they have just got to sell it. it is something we will see a lot of, slick advertising campaigns and public information campaigns and it isa public information campaigns and it is a good thing. it is something that will test the capacity to get the system where it is needed? logistically it will be very, very difficult. the hope is over the next week, possibly ten days we can get the first shots taking place, probably in hospitals because they are in the facilities that they can

keep the vaccine under. but we need to be careful that hopefully this is the beginning of the end of this trauma. but it does not suggest that this thing is going to be over any time soon. we know the four chief medical officers across the uk have written a letter this week, making it clear they don't believe the roll—out of this vaccine will necessarily cut radically the numbers of hospital admissions for the nhs over the next three or four months of the winter period. we know there is going to be a slackening of there is going to be a slackening of the rules concerning people getting together and households over christmas. the chief medical office rs christmas. the chief medical officers are worried about that for the hospitals. we know the covid, the hospitals. we know the covid, the lateral flow test, there are problems with that. it gives you the results in a few hours, but false negatives are a big part of the problem in close to half of the people who were tested. so even if people who were tested. so even if people have the test and they are told you are negative, you have

still got to social distance and wear a mask. crucially, the idea this vaccine is out there might psychologically make people feel they can relax a little bit, they can forget about the six feet distance between each other and not wear masks and so on. there is still a lot that we have got to work through with this, despite the vaccine being hi, which is something we should all applaud. eunice, that is the key point, isn't it? in terms whether we adapt our behaviour, the virus still needs people to feed off and the vaccination is going to have to go and the vaccination is going to have togoa and the vaccination is going to have to go a long way before it runs out of people to feed off and is effectively starved of what it needs to continue reproducing? absolutely. that is why the world health organization that is why the world health 0rganization said yesterday that the vaccine does not mean the end of covid—19. people need to continue to be alert, the rules of social distancing, mask wiring and all of that, they need to continue to be in

place because the virus is rampant. there will also be problems with production of the vaccine. pfizer announced they are having difficulties in terms of delivering the number of doses they were aiming to have ready next year, because there vaccine is very complicated, access to raw materials has been very difficult. the other vaccines have complicated supply chains for their production. i am thinking of their production. i am thinking of the oxford astrazeneca vaccine. it has not yet been regulated by the uk. then there is the logistical problems of rolling out vaccines, they need to be delivered in a very special conditions and circumstances. it would take a good year until the vast majority of populations in britain, in europe and around the world are vaccinated.

that leaves us with at least ten months of living with the virus and if we relax too much it means we will be living with a third wave, potentially a fourth wave of the virus. you are a cheerful soul, eunice. the great covid—sceptic donald trump is campaigning in georgia this weekend. the republican family is staying loyal, knowing his endorsement could make all the difference to holding the two senate seats subject to run—off elections in a month's time. victory then will sweeten the loss of the white house because it will makejoe biden's task that much harder. before you are isolating, because he have to coming back into the uk from the states, you were on the campaign trail. is there anything you recall from that experience that brings home some of the real, raw tension thatis home some of the real, raw tension that is in american daily life as a result of this election? this is my

seventh us presidential election i have covered, 96, bill clinton was the first. i have been going back to america and live there in that intervening period. this is the first... this was a shock to me, the first... this was a shock to me, the first time i came across that heat melding and the intertwining of fact and fiction in use. i had never seen this on this scale anywhere in the world. and it has to be said, it is a by—product much more prevalent as a by—product much more prevalent as a result of the last three and a half years of donald trump being in office. the idea you have facts and you have conspiracy theories and they can go together. the idea you can have suggestions that are put out on facebook groups or by russian trolls that are put out there, that is absorbed into the body politic and into the national political

debate and it becomes part of the narrative, it becomes part of the story. so you don't necessarily have people saying i believe in this conspiracy theory, and the facts are rubbish. what you have is people saying, i don't know. i am not sure. it is that confusion, the sense of discombobulating that people have that makes them, makes it difficult for them to make the decisions a lot of other people around the world might think, why have you decided to do that? the facts clearly state this. that was a big, big shock to me and something thatjoe biden or whoever comes after him in the next ten, 15 years is going to have to grapple with in a really meaningful way, particularly a social media giant to become more powerful and more and more important. as an illustration of that, we have this debate over the voting machines that have been in use in many us states and that has got caught up with the

conspiracy theories about the allegations of stolen votes of results being changed and so on. why has that hit home for so many, particularly republicans and trump supporters, who feel the selection has, in some way, been stolen from them? because that is what trump says. there is absolutely no proof of any of it. all of the detailed examinations, the court cases, the republican secretaries of state keep saying the same thing over and over again. trump has, absolutely as clive says, figured out a way to magnify lies for his own benefit. he isa magnify lies for his own benefit. he is a genius at it. there is an ecosystem of right wing media, fox news is chief among them, but lots of others and they all become self

reinforcing. he dismisses things he finds inconvenient as fake news. he has now undercut people's faith in neutral recording. the soul becomes a matter of tribe. people say, if trump says it, it must be true. i feel aggrieved, i don't like those political elites. he plays the grievance and uses social media to bamboozle people. it has worked and it is absolutely a scary thing for the future of american democracy. we hope a normal, stable man like joe biden can pull away from that, turn the volume down and get people back to talking normally about politics. but trump is probably going to stay on the stage with his millions and millions of twitter followers and keep throwing as much gasoline into things as he can to keep himself

prominent, keep himself rich and keep himself out ofjail. it is going to be a very complicated thing to bring the us back from this dangerous place. eunice, jeff talking about the tribal niss and the bitterness that has crept into the bitterness that has crept into the body politic over the last few yea rs, the body politic over the last few years, there is a temptation forjoe biden to reach out. on the other hand, you could argue that barack 0bama tried to govern across the aisle, much good did it do him and after eight years the response was the republican voters went for donald trump, the strongest medicine they could possibly have chosen. it doesn't suggest that biden has much hope of reaching out? yes, i would agree with that argument. that argument is going to be tested very, very early on into biden's presidency. he will try to get a stimulus package approved or any remedial measures to help the

american population who have become unemployed because of the pandemic, and there are many millions and unemployment is rising very steeply in the united states. this goes far beyond what a politician likejoe biden can do or even the democratic party. this is where the media and different news organisations need to reach out, need to change the way they produce news. because as clive said earlier, the big problem has to do with the inability of people now of being able to distinguish what is fa ct of being able to distinguish what is fact from a lie. everything with which you disagree is fake news and everything you agree with is news, isa everything you agree with is news, is a fact. this is really, really serious. a german philosopher said the road to a totalitarian regime became very clear when people were no longer able to distinguish fact from truth. america is not becoming a totalitarian regime but the fragility of democracy is, it is all

there for us to see. it is very important that organisations in society and the media that plays a very important role in sustaining democracy, but the media starts to perhaps be less polarising, perhaps bringing more grey shades of opinion, as opposed to yes or no positions. they need to bring this into the body politic, so it reaches people and they start to discuss politics in a different way from the one we have been discussing in the last ten years. it has been so poisonous to our democracies. last ten years. it has been so poisonous to our democraciesm will be a particular challenge to do that while this political debate continues unabated. we have the georgia elections coming up next month and those elections could determine the effectiveness of the biden presidency? absolutely, a lot of people, and this includes americans, forget there are three branches of governments in the united states. millions turn out for the presidential election and in the

fear votes for congress, not as many people bother to do that. i think if joe biden can win those two seats in georgia it will bring a tie in the senate so the vice president kamala harris will have the deciding vote and that would be easy for him to get his legislation and measures through. the elements are pointing in the right direction for democrats. georgia voted democrat in the election, first time in 30 years. the two republican candidates have their own problems, violations, potentially and a lot, some suggest is racist rhetoric towards the democratic opponent. the importance of these races is important for democrats to see now, as a result they are motivated to get out there and produce the result on the day. but i also think potentially covid could play a part in this as well. joe biden seems to have a plan, he seems to have some kind of way of dealing with this mandate wearing of

masks in the first 100 days. the vaccine is rolling out and that could tip the balance towards them. indeed it could make joe biden getting his legislative agenda out there a lot easier if he wins the senate. if, the most powerfulword in the universe. thank you all very much. thank you for being with us this weekend. geeta guru—murphy is in this chair next weekend. dojoin her then for more dateline london. from all of us here, goodbye. hello there. for many of us today is going to be a pretty cloudy day, we've got a few patches of rain to come through. now we have seen a little bit of snow mixed in, particularly over the hills.

this was gloucestershire early this morning near the wye valley with a sprinkling of snow. the cold air has been moving in, of course, across the uk, coming in from polar regions thanks to this area of low pressure. this is what brought the heavy snow that quite a few of you had yesterday. today, temperatures are a degree or two higher so for the most part it is cold rain that is falling. but it's still cold enough to bring some snow across the high ground in scotland above about 200 metres elevation and a bit of snow as well mixed in with this as it pushes into parts of wales as well. now into the afternoon, generally the weather is going to slowly improve, it'll slowly brighten up and the patches of rain become a little less widespread so there will be a bit more in the way of dry weather around. it stays chilly, however. temperatures struggling — highs today of around six maybe eight in places and that is colder than we often see at this time of the year. 0vernight tonight, we've got more rain to come off the north sea

affecting east scotland and north—east england as well. maybe a bit more rain returning from the south—east of england as well, but in between these areas of rain it turns chilly with clearer skies with patches of frost expected. that means we could have some icy surfaces to start the day on sunday as well as a few fog patches which could take time to clear as well. this area of rain, as it pushes inland across parts of england, perhaps reaching east wales, the rain becomes light and patchy but it will leave a legacy of cloudy skies again across a good part of england. the best of any sunshine probably for west scotland, northern ireland and north—west england but after a colder start to the day, there's temperatures will be lower into the afternoon. a colder afternoon with highs of typically four to six celsius. into monday, we find ourselves between a couple of areas of low pressure. the wind is very light between these two systems and so monday promises to be a cold, frosty and potentially very murky start to the day with extensive fog patches and some of that fog is likely to linger all day. where that happens, temperatures will struggle to get much above freezing but even if the fog does lift into low cloud, we are only looking at lows

of around four or 5 degrees and we've got some rain towards the east coast. that rain through monday night pushes inland, bumps into the cold air and turns to snow for a time in scotland and northern england over high ground.

this is bbc news with the latest headlines for viewers in the uk and around the world. uk prime minister borisjohnson and the president of the european commission will speak later today , to try and break the brexit trade talks deadlock. we keep calm, as always, and if there is still a way, we will see, huh? the two sides remain divided on fishing rights, the rules governing state subsidies for business and how the deal is policed — uk businesses say they need clarity now. the government have sent out a letter to every business in the country saying "check, change, go". well, check what? change what? go where?