administration. we have focused on it at the department. there is an interagency group on privacy that is also working and in the ftc who is a primary enforcement agency in the area of privacy has also been very active in this area. so there is a lot going on and i think all of it is important. at the end of the day it comes back to our desire to see the internet continue to thrive and grow as the innovative economic engine that it's been. we think that happens only if people trust the internet and in people's understanding that the privacy protected is fundamental to continuing that trust that people have in the process. so, it's -- i think it's quite important that the administration be as focused as it is on the issue. >> this is "the communicators." our guest is dan lawrence strickling, of the national telecommunications and information administration. lynn stanton, senior editor telecommunications report. thank you both. >> thank you.

corker in december the u.s. supreme court will take a case involving a 2007 arizonan law concerning businesses who knowingly hire undocumented workers. this law is different from arizona 2010 statute that requires local law enforcement to check the immigration status of suspected illegal immigrants. hosted by the american

constitution society, this is over an hour. >> good afternoon. thank you for joining. welcome to the briefing on chamber of commerce which is a case currently pending before the supreme court and argued in a few weeks on december 8th. on the and this is the director of programs of the american constitution society for the law and policy. for those of you not familiar, we are a network of lawyers, law professors, policy makers and promote the vitality of the constitution and the fundamental values it expresses. individual rights and liberties, genuine equality, access to justice, democracy and it will fall. the case under discussion today is a challenge to the legal arizona workers act which imposes sanctions on employers who hire and statutes words unauthorized aliens. and the question poses is whether the state law is presented by federal immigration

law. as such, the case of the delude to the possible court of another controversial arizona law the recently enacted sd 1070 which criminalizes the failure of non-citizens to carry immigration documentation and is currently the subject of litigation pending before the ninth circuit court of appeals. it seems appropriate therefore to mention today we released an issue brief on the constitutionality of sb 1070 for the three professors at the university of arizona and copies of the issue are available with the registration table or on the web site. to start off to the it's my pleasure to introduce the moderator of our program, neil kinkopf pure neil teaches constitutional law, legislation and civil procedure georgia state university college of law which he also directed the center of state legislation and policy. he served as counselor to senate democrats during the impeachment trial of president clinton and was a special assistant in the department of justice's office of legal counsel, where his practice focus on issues of presidential power.

we are also pleased that he co-chairs the issue grew when separation of powers and federalism all of which make him the moderator for today's discussion. please join me in welcoming neil. [applause] >> thank you, kara, for that. and i think what really makes me and at moderator for to this panel is i love preemption. i love teaching -- it makes the a lot of other things. [laughter] but when i teach the constitutional law i love to teach preemption. in some measure because it is a really hot issue in the constitutional law. and in some measure, and this is why when i teach i teach me to last. it scrambles of the settled rooting interests in the constitutional law. by the end of the class of the liberal conservative divide is settled in the classroom on issues of division of power between the federal and state governments to decide is roughly conservative like the states and

liberals like the federal government but with the hot issues that have been coming up recently and have been a staple of the court's docket over the last few years their rooting interests get upset because what's three often been happening is states have more progressive rules with respect to consumer protection with respect to business interest and so business interests seek to have federal law preempts state law so conservatives in those instances tend to like the federal law and liberals tend to like the state laws and celebrities all confused and the degree to the constitutional law class i've found. so here to further scramble the matter and the rooting interests with a chamber of commerce which has kara indicated will be argued in a few weeks. it involves first federal law which is expressly exclusive and

being expressly exclusive that would settle the matter. federal law is valid, it pre-empts state law if it means to be expressly exclusive problem is the federal law includes savings clause allows states to maintain licensing and similar law. arizona has said that articles of incorporation our license so if you violate federal law and arizona the licensing rule is you lose your articles of incorporation. it's a little more complicated than that but it is the business death penalty that the governor mentioned on assigning the law. and so the question is whether the federal law pre-empts that. the state law also includes a requirement that businesses use the federal e-verify database to verify worker status, and several law makes the e-verify system voluntary so we have a question of whether that is

pre-empted. the resolution of those issues could have important ramifications in two areas. one is in the area of federal preemption of business law, the area that has been hot and i think the next few years at least will remain hot on the supreme court docket. the other is state immigration law. over the last five or six years the states have enacted thousands of always related to immigration and the overall tenure of those police has been to make immigration law stricter, tight, more draconian on immigrants and people whose citizenship status might be in question were to impose more exact enforcement regimes. and so whether or not those are pre-empted and sort of preeminently we might think of the arizona law as the 1070 the issue briefed about today.

this case may have important ramifications in that area aspinall. so we have assembled a terrific panel to discuss these and more questions. i am not going to go through all of their qualifications because if i did, they would make my list quite pale, going to leave that as the one that's out there. we are going to pretend to be to begin with the professor visas and speed from drexel university who will wield a framework for addressing these preeminent issues negative we will turn to jennifer chang newell from the aclu who's going to talk about issues from the immigrant's right perspective followed by sri srinivasan who wrote one of the amicus briefs in the case and who is calling to talk about as the amicus brief business interests at issue in these cases and finally we have david from the cato institute who's going to not talk about the

state interest in these cases. anil? >> verso would like to thank the acs for inviting me to participate in this forum. let me start by giving an overview of the federal of the issue arising. the federal law has extensively regulated immigration for a very long time going back to the 1880s and increasingly over the 20th century developing a rather comprehensive regulatory scheme governing innovation and national depue yet until adoption of the immigration reform and control act in 1986, there was no federal provision on the hiring of office voice immigrants. it came after a decade of public and congressional debate over the issue of the legal immigration and it marked a major policy shift by expanding federal immigration regulation

into the interior of the country and physically into the private workplace and one reason that took so long is that in setting up the employer sanctions regime which will talk about in a minute congress sought to balance a number of different and in peking policy of objectives. on the one hand congress obviously sought to prevent employers from hiring unauthorized immigrants but on the other hand congress sought to minimize the burdens and disruptions for employers who after all were now being enlisted of leased by the federal government for the first time he essentially as immigration enforcement agents in a sense. congress also sought to address another set of concerns that an overly severe or burden regime might lead to discrimination by employers against employees who appear foreign in some sense if

that were easy or less burdensome for the employers to do that in fact going through the of verifying authorization. so it requires employers to examine documents and complete an online form for each employee to establish their

>> if it satisfies the federal definition of what licensing and other similar laws actually means, than those provisions would not be displaced no matter what arizona chooses to call them, and if they are not preempted, they might be appliedly preempted with the employer sanctions regime. what does the arizona law require? there's two sets of requirements. first, it's a state law offense of knowingly or intentionally employing an unauthorized alien that purports to the definition under federal law of unauthorized alien, not the same thing as an individual who is unlawfully present and 9

elements of the prohibition of unauthorized aliens in order in an attempt not to prevent any conflict. the ways in which the law operates independently of federal law is what raised the preemptive issues at issue. the panel will talk about them as well. procedurally the law operates through state and local institutions without requiring a determination whether an employer has employed an unauthorized alien. in terms of the penalties, the law authorizes the revocation of the employer's licenses within the savings clause, but what constitutes a license under arizona law, the statute uses a broad definition which is different from how other parts of arizona law use the term and how federal law uses the term,

and including, for example, articles of incorporation, the law defines those as licenses, and arguably operates as a regulatory system more than as a licensing law. now, the lower courts have upheld this law against the preemption challenge, and the other panelists will talk to the details of that. a couple of issues to think about here is how do we actually characterize the arizona law? is it in fact an immigration law? is it a law regulating the workplace? is it a licensing law? they may be overlapping or related or subtle, but in terms of how the preemption arguments play out in the supreme court, those characterizations might be relevant. there's other thoughts, but i'll leave those for a moment for the other panel. >> okay. thank you. >> hi, i just wanted to thank acs for inviting us here for the

important issues. i was asked to address the immigrants rights perspective on this issue and why the 9th circuit got it wrong when they upheld the lawfulness of the arizona law. .. that issue, the essentials question is whether a state can

mandate e-verify when the federal law means participation in that program voluntarily. you know, we argue that conflict -- the mandate is being self evident to conflict with federal law on the ninth circuit didn't think so. we think the ninth circuit was wrong for many reasons including the statute, the relevant statutory provision said multiple times and lawyers have to have a choice and whether they want to enroll in e-verify, that e-verify is a voluntary program, voluntary and shlaes are repeated throughout the relevant provision and in taking away that choice, arizona is negating what congress is trying to do. in addition i think it's relevant to think about as anil

mentioned from mandating participation and e-verified. congress has -- there have been several proposals to mandate e-verify and congress and none of the proposals have yet passed or in other words congress has repeatedly declined to make it mandatory. and if you think of noted it's quite obvious. if every state or every state or locality did what arizona is trying to do, then congress's intent of making this program voluntary would be entirely negated so that is what our argument is. ast has been mentioned, there are numerous problems with the e-verify system. non-citizens who are authorized to work into the united states are many, many times more likely to be erroneous to get an

erroneous result from the system saying that they're not actually authorized and one of the main concerns here is discrimination against non-citizens, employers, and it's already been documented even under the federal employer sanctions regime that employers have a tendency to discriminate against non-citizen in the employment process the sanctions regime have caused the terrapin congressional studies and many other studies that have well-documented this issue. so moving to the other half of the case, which is about whether the employer sanctions regime that arizona has established is either expressly or implied pre-empted, so that question would be quite simple if there were not the seventh word parenthetical because as has been mentioned eight pre-empts

states from enacting or imposing civil or criminal sanctions on those who employee amount of resilience and then there's the part and to see that except for licensing or similar law and that has been the cause of a lot of consternation and that is the big question and it's a complicated question. what did congress really been? who we think the congress was thinking of the time is the following. at the time it was enacted and for several years before hand, so it was enacted in 1986 there were numerous states that had formerly were contacting laws and they were licensing laws that licensed farm contractors, the regulated the fitness of the labor contractor to do business, they imposed requirements that the labor contractors had to

meet to do business in the labor contractor. these laws often also included other kinds of the agricultural workers including forestry workers, and there were several steve laws at the time that expressly required that farm labor contractors refrain from hiring undocumented workers, and if they did so, the licenses would be sanctioned. so was the state of the law at the time when it was enacted, and as the audience probably knows, at the time and today, farm labour is a context in which undocumented employment is a special concern, and what we think the converse was thinking of when they sit licensing or similar law is they were thinking of these farm labour

contractor licensing laws they were not always called licensing laws, sometimes they were called registration laws and sometimes the end of forestry workers so that is why we think they were really talking about. getting back to the statute says, the statute says licensing or similar laws pumas we are thinking what does that mean here, what does that mean for us? as it has also been mentioned, the arizona law basically defines licensing in an extremely broad way. if it doesn't end the licensing scheme, it doesn't establish a licensing scheme, it basically says all of these things that traditionally are not licensed as we are going to call licenses, articles and a corporation licenses and what that means is your existence as a business in the state of arizona we are now calling that a permission in a license and we

can sanction you if you do certain things under this and we can in the existence of your business if we find that you employed, also employed unauthorized workers at some time. and our argument is you can't just take things that are not licensed and deem them to the licenses and then call it a licensing scheme. it is and what congress intended. at minimum, it has to be a bomb site licensing scheme and what a bonafide licensing scheme is a scheme that regulates the fitness of a business to a particular thing. i see that i'm running out of time here so i guess i will just say a couple more things quickly the bottom line is stepping back a little bit about what arizona has done is arizona licensing

scheme is it really fits within that parenthetical than the exception swallows the whole rule because any state can take anything and, with a license and say we are going to sanction your license therefore it's covered in the exception so i can basically have it any employer sanctions i wont even though law says you generally speaking states can't do that and to illustrate that quickly the state of south carolina actually did, they passed the law be in which they decided what they would do is they would in butte licenses. but they did is they decided they would impute licenses to every employer in the state cities in the employ years in south carolina don't actually have an employment license they decided they are going to suddenly based on this law and hit a license to you and based on that sanction you if you employ of christ workers. if that fits within the

exception the there's basically no limit to the principal and the entire preemption provision a self expressed preemption would be negated. i was also asked to talk about the implications of this case for cases like sd 1070 and i think i've run out of time so maybe i will leave that for -- >> thank you, jennie. >> thanks, neil and acs for putting on this panel and my fellow panelists. it's a pleasure to be here. also thanks to whoever made these brownies because they are really tasty. [laughter] i am a partner at my years and become a brief on behalf of a consortium of business organizations. of course the chamber of commerce is the main party in this case, so we know the business interests have a strong stake in what happens in this case and we have supplemented that on behalf of other business organizations including state

and local chambers and a variety of other business organizations, and i think one thing that's interesting about this case is one of the rare cases in which you get a coalition of forces on one side like a business organizations and then coupled with organizations like the one jennifer represents, this is not something you see every day. of course there's the competing perspectives and the goodwill of line that, but i argued in an immigration case last term and was on behalf of an individual had been deported and wanted to get back into the country and the chamber of commerce was nowhere to be found. understandably because they didn't have an interest and conversely we have been involved in business cases where civil rights groups and immigration groups haven't been involved because they don't have an interest of this case of a confluence of circumstances that bring together that coalition and i think it is going to be interesting to see what role at any that has in the litigation because it is clear that you see this kind of coalition come together and it may be the

justices who find themselves empathetic to different perspectives along the spectrum might come together in this case anyway their instincts might not ordinarily bring them together. .. >> what you've seen in recent years is a real, i think, explosion in state and local

efforts to weigh in in the immigration arena, and the employment arein in in particular directly at stake here, but in the immigration arena more generally, and it's the sort of patchwork resulting from that that gives business groups to file in a case like this and put meat on that bone, and immigration laws generally, according to this 2010 report, in 2005, there was 300 immigration related bills introduced in states and localities. in 2006, that downled to 570 bills, and in 2007, it tripled to over 1500 bills, and in 2008, another 1300 bills, and in 2009, more than 1500 bills. these are bills introduced, not enacted, but you see the sort of activity we talk about in this arena that gives rise to these concern, and many were enacted, 30, 38, 240, 206, a en222 along

the years. you see the activity in the arena. the extent of the employment arena particularly at stake here in the employment sphere, 244 unemployment bills introduced in 45 states in 2007. in 2008, 13 states enacted 19 more employer related immigration laws, and in 200912 states enacted 31 laws, and six other laws were vetoed. 24 is a real -- this is a real explosion activities that gave rise to this brief, and the concerns cut across both issues that have been raised so far. with respect to the first half the case that deals not with the mandate to use the particular system, but the sanctions imposed on employers who hire unauthorized workers. the concern is really that the uniformity that is evidenced by the federal scheme is

compromised if states and localities come together and impose a bunch of competing alliances. that is one set of important considerations at stake here, and the other stake of considerations at stake deals with the system of e-verify that jennifer described is a voluntary system. if you impose a mandate on businesses to use that system, it has its own set of burdens because there's startup costs and ongoing monitoring costs associated with that system. it's unlike the paper driven process mandated by federal law where the burden of compliance is fairly minimal, and there are standards that come into play that make it much, much easier for employers and owners requirement, and puts the owners on the federal government to enforce them, where as the e-verify system puts a greater degree of burden on practices on

businesses to come up with the computer systems necessary to comply, and those burdens are with respect to nationwide businesses, we have information in our brief just to add specifics to it about the burdens imposed on a nationwide business like wail mart given the -- walmart given the number of applications they get in a year, and they are quite substantial. one thing i think we can talk about if the time permits later on is how this case fits in to what neil identified earlier which is the broader scheme of business preemptive cases because two terms ago you saw three very important decisions. last term, there were none in the preemption arena, and now you see three or four, so it will be interesting to see how this fits in with the others. perhaps we can get into that

later. >> okay, great, thank you. >> thank you for having me and thank you all of you for the opportunity to speak here today. i'm here to present a minority report of sorts, but it's a very half hearted one. in this particular case, i think that the state is within its powers, and i think that the 9th circuit get it right, but all the policy concerns pushing the other direction. i just smazed my -- summarized by views as follows. i think they got it right, but the i think the arizona law gets the policy wrong, however, and really it's not so much arizona's immigration policy, but our national immigration policy that's in dire need of an update, and to talk about some of the unexpected consequences and what i think are some of the

things we don't talk about that we should. first, the 9th circuit got this correct. the clause saves arizona's statute. the -- as previously mentioned, it allows licensing or similar statutes. that's a very, very broad category, and business licensing is an area traditionally occupied by the states. i think that language from the locke decision in 2000 will basically give the tie to the state, so where there's an assumption that the historic police powers of the states were not to be superseded by the act unless it was a clear purpose of congress. i think where we have a mixed record, i think it's a vague part of the statute and mixed record on what exactly did congress intend? i think the tie is going to go to arizona, and use of the federal system as opposed to a state level immigration registry

clearly preprepreempted. there's the good faith compliance provision of the law and the licensing situation as opposed to the narrow one in the brief is the essential reading for what is clearly established as congress' intent. i think that's more of the fault of the historical record than anything else. i think the presumption towards state in this case carries over to where arizona whether they make e-verify mandatory or not, they could, but they do not do so, so that's the only time i want to spend defending arizona's case in this. but, the second, i think arizona, the law, gives us the wrong policy outcome, and i think that's true not just with arizona's case, but at the

national level. we are in need of an update, and i think a larger temporary worker visa program really is where we have to move the public debate toward, and a lot of this is on a lot of false assumptions. we're not economically weakened by having immigrant workers in the country. my colleague at cato has written a book "mad about trade" that makes the case that the united states economy is strengthed and not weakened by a free of exchange not just of goods, but of laborment i think that the public has business statistics that will make that case more effectively, and the socials driving a lot of conservative furor based on myth that the claim that imgrants equal violent crime, and while there's been instances, there was a rancher killed by an illegal immigrant in march that was a

rally cry of 1070, but the statistics don't show this is a dangerous bunch of people who want to do anything beside come and get a job. in fact, the people of arizona are actuallily less likely to be victims of crimes than they have been for the last four decades, and according to the department of justice figures, the violent crime rate in 2008 was the lowest since 1971 and the property crime rate was the lowest since 1966, so imgrants remain a more a low abiding citizens with regard to those crimes than those who reside here legally. yes, phoenix has a crime rate with any urban center in america, but it's not out of proportion from similarly sized cities in the country, and detroit, a city not known for being a mag innocent for illegal imgrants, has a crime rate three times that of phoenix, so i think other social factors drive

crime and not immigration. third, i want to touch on the up expected consequences of our current immigration policies. now, i think the best thing coming out of this lit cation is that -- litigation is that enough people are unhappy with the litigation that we have actually have a real comprehensive move towards immigration reform at the federal level. i think that debate includes fb1070. so, arizona understandably frustrated by the lack of federal process in changing federal immigration laws passed laws that in some respects went too far. this needs to make legislation a priority and not a electoral weapon. we need to secure the border and increase the law, but it's like revising our drug laws after we won the drug war that we cleaned up the supply for drugs.

that's cry city. there's consequences of people affected by it in the rule of law that it's time to rethink the policy. the obama administration has been a disappointment on this point. reforming our drug laws may help immigration to the extent it cuts the economic legs out from the cartels in mexico, and finally what i deal with with immigration law is the national security angle of this. i bring this up because it's a corner i work on and this is foreign terrorism and the market to facilitate this. the routes created and maintained by drug administration policies are a threat to the terrorism context. if i was a foreign terrorist and didn't want to go through officials to immigrate, my task is easier by the market for

border crossing capability. the economic incentives are now so strongly encouraging north and south infiltration, that the minisubmarines are disposable. they don't even drive them back anymore. this is what happens when markets are driven under ground to have a class of contraband, this is a human contraband. i think the u.s. policy of ignoring the basic economics at work on our borders has actually made us less safe and not more. with that, i'll close and leave it to the questions. >> thank you, david. first, do any of you want to respond to the comments of the others? anything anybody said give each other heart burn? okay. good. only the brownies are giving heart burn i guess. i had a question before turning it over to the audience. my question is, i wonder -- you've each done a nice job of

doing what you were supposed to do so as mon ray tore i'm very pleased and in presenting your own perspective or not merits of the case. i'm curious why the supreme court took it? it's not an obvious circuit split. they didn't strike a statute down and upheld it, and the panel of the 9th circuit has democratic and republican appointees, it's not something we expect the supreme court to watch closely, so the supreme court took the case. it might be that it thinks the -9dth circuit is obviously wrong, but it's not obviously wrong having read it. i mean, there's arguments to be made, but is there a trap door here somewhere? if so, what is it? what is the court thinking and why did they grant cert in this case? >> well, i think one thing to keep in mind in terms of just wrong procedure is that this case was granted after the court

asked for the views of the solicitor general, and the one tried and true strategy to get a court interested in a case is to try to pitch the case in a way that they will ask the government for its views because the statistics are quite clear. in the cases in which the court asked the government for its views and the government chimes in and recommends the court takes the case, the court ordinarily takes the case. this is one where i think the battle was largely won by purr sueding the court to ask the government for its views, and when the government weighed in, and the government said take the case, at that point, the court is hard pressed to deny it. i thought it was interesting what the government did in terms of the cert recommendation was that the government cert recommendation arose around the same time, and i can't remember the exact sequence of events although other people probably would. around the same time on litigation on the other arizona

law commenced, and there was three questions presented in this case by the face of the petition, and i think it's important for the preemption to keep distengt expressed preemption and applied preemption. this law preemptions and defines the subject matter to preemption. applied preseemings says we don't care what is says, but as an inherent matter allowing the state common lawsuits to survive conflicts with the federal scheme, even though nothing tells us it has to be so. this case before the court now and the broader case before the 9th circuit is that in this one, there's an expressed preemption claim and an applied preemption claim. around the same time the government filed suit against 1070 that is a applied preemption case, that they take

it only on the argument, and it didn't recommend, in fact, it recommended that the court not take the case on applied preemption, and i don't know why that happened, nobody does, but it's interesting that at the same time that litigating implied preemption on 1070, they recommended the court not take this case. now, the court went ahead and did it, it took the case. one thing that's interesting to see in terms of gauging what the implication of this case will be for the other immigration debate going on is whether the court touches the applied preemption issue. if if does, it dpil -- fills up the preemption in 1070. it will have lesser implications for the other lit cation. it's not to say it won't have any, but the overlap will be less significant than it otherwise might be. >> okay. >> one thing to add to that, i

may be recalling incorrectly, by i think the solicitor general because the applied issues on the two different halfs of the statute, and i recall that at least part of what they opposed on the cert was the e-verify issue, and on that issue the court unless they decide it's granted on that issue, the court can't -- there is no expressed preemption, and the court has to address applied preemption with with respect to that part of the arizona law. i think the federal government may have had slightly different competing situations with respect to something that could have driven why they recommended against taking cert on that particular issue. >> thank you. we have any questions from the audience? yeah? back there.

>> thank you very much. i have two questions. one for ms. new and the other for mr. rickers. on what e-system you talked about, this may be wrong, but there's not a clear enforcement mechanism for the e-verify system, it's and even if there is a system that a lot of employers # are not using e-verify in arizona and they are not prosecutorred in any way. does this make it mandatory in name only. the law tries to tell employers that it is mandatory, and does that concern you given the arguments you said with licensing and licensing is mandatory and not truly mandatory, and i appreciated

your comments about the misperceptions about illegal imgrants in terms of the criminal acts, and i think there's similar speculation on both sides about health care costs or education costs, and i'm curious about your theories why there's so much speculation on empirical questions that could be easily resolved and camps say they are increasing violent crime and why this could be seemingly statistics. >> on the question about the e-verify mandate, i think there has been some lack of clarity about exactly what the enforcement mechanism is. i'm not aware there has been any actual prosecution of any employer at this point, but i do -- my understanding is that there has been some enforcement activity in the form of

investigations and i don't know if raid is the proper term, but there have been employers who have had their premise investigated, let's use the term investigated. you know, even that kind of enforcement activity presumably can, you know, create an incentive for employers to comply that there's no dispute that on the face of the law, every employer in the state of arizona is required to enroll in e-verify. >> wrpt to the statistics and where i guess do the bad numbers come from in public debate, i guess the motivation is political gain. there's people getting into office running on campaigns, you know, that sort of have it as their bread and butter, those claims. i know it gets tossed around how much illegal immigrants cost or

don't cost society. i think actually a lot of that is driven not in narrative but in fats. when you have an underground labor department property tax and state taxes deal with this better than progressive income taxes. you have to pay your rent to somebody so it gets passed on via the landlord where the income taxes don't deal with that. i think texas because they have property driven tax base, it's better than california, not that it makes the debate any more sense sensible. >> yeah, right here. >> i'm mark from press associates, a news service. a couple questions. first of all, talk more about the wide ranging coalition that has cited with the -- sided with the chamber of comes

with the arizona law, everybody from the chamber of commerce and the aclu to the service employees to the yet the immigrants rights projects to, you know, you name it, how they call came to the, and what particular points do they agree on. second, and this was luning through my mind as you were giving your presentations. does the 1986 act expressly have a prohibition against states going beyond its boundaries. there are other labor laws, and we can call this is labor law since employers are barred from hiring undocumented workers, that allows states to use the federal laws, things like fair labor standards agent. does this one say that this is a floor and the states could go beyond this or not? >> well, on the question of how all these groups came together,

you know, i think as has been acknowledged, there's some strange fellows here. my recollection is what initially happened was, you north korea the im-- you know, the immigrants civil rights group including the aclu, the immigration law center, and i can't list them all, but the groups that originally sued the civil rights and immigrants rights and religious rights sued together in one lawsuit, and i hope i'm remembering this correct, and the chamber of commerce, i believe the business groups sued in a separate lawsuit, and those lawsuits were consolidated, and so what you really have before the court now is two or, i think it's two, but possibly more, consolidated lawsuits, and the chamber of

commerce and carter phillips is now the counsel of record for all -- well, is arguing the case, and we wrote our brief together. we submitted, you know, a single brief of over round of briefing. that sort of how it all happened. i don't know if that answers your question. >> can you talk about their points of commerce? are they in agreement on everything or disagreements? >> i think, i mean, just to give a couple of examples, i think, you know, i think everyone is in agreement that this law is a bad law, that it's, you know, preempted, that there is a huge problem with having a patchwork of, you know, 50 or 100,000 different laws across every city and state in the country, and that's a problem that, you know, both immigrants rights groups and business groups are equally concerned about. i think one of the areas of

tension at least from the immigrants right perspective is, you know, we talk about immigrants and unauthorized workers who are noncitizens facing discrimination, and you know, the people causing that discrimination, you know, in the context are businesses and employers, and so that's always a little bit tricky to talk about because, you know, i think that the business per sperktive is, you know, we don't discriminate, and the immigrants rights perspective is, but, you know, our constituency does face discrimination. that is one example of an area of tension. >> this context going babe to the original enactment of the 186 law. at that time the employer groups were concerned about the burdens that employer sanctions would have and immigrants rights groups were worried about the intention of discrimination in particular. at that time organized labor and some community groups were on

the other side of the employer sanctions debate and concerned about the effects that imgrant workers would have on wages for u.s. based workers. those groups have shifted their position a great deal. one of the interesting things to see coming out of this case in congress is now the con stin went sighs -- con stin went sighs are more in favor, and at the same time in the congress debates, there really isn't any significant proposal to repeal employer sanctions even though there's questions about how well it worked. on the question of the preemption clause, the text the clause in the statutes says that the federal law preempts any state or local law imposing criminal sanctions upon those who employee or recruit unauthorized ail aliens except

for the paraphernalia thet call that jennifer gave with licensing of similar laws. there's not a lot of room for -- i mean, the argt here that the -- argument here that arizona is making is this is mirroring federal lawing a federal definition, it's basically a mirrored provision, so how strong this clause is whether it leaves room for tougher penltds at the -- penalties at the state level is one of the questions here in addition to the question how much room does the savings clause leave? >> real quickly i wanted to mention one another other key counsel groups representing plaintiffs on the civil rights side is maldf. >> one of the other groups that bears emphasizing is the united states. the fact that the united states

comes on one side of the case matters a great deal especially with implied preemption cases. what sort of impact does it have on federal enforcement? when the federal government comes in and says one thing, that carries a lot of weight, and so you have all the groups that the question referred to plus the united states on one side which seems significant. >> i guess a couple of just things to add to that that because of the federal government was involved through the solicitor general office and justice kagan refused herself in this case, and another quick thing i was going to mention is now leaving my mind, so i will not mention it. . [laughter] >> right here. >> i'm just wondering how you think things height turn out if the state goes in the other direction? obviously it's the antiimmigrant direction now, but what if a

state passes a law that says states may not answer e-verify or a law that says we're going to offer free food to people who came here illegally, and i know they came here illegally, what would happen then? >> i guess one thing in response to that is that state passed a law saying employers cannot participate in e-verify at least until the error rate in e-verify falls below a certain level, and that was the state of illinois, and what happened in that situation, that law 1 no longer in effect because it's invalidated under the exact same, you know, preemption arguments or closely similar preemption arguments at issue in this case, and the bush administration sued the state of illinois in that case. i think in general with proimmigrant laws, it really

depends on what the context is. you know, i think your question really highlights that preemption that leaves the civil rights perspective is a neutral legal doctrine. you know, whether it helps our had hurts depends on if federal law is good on the issues you're concerned about or whether state law is better on the issues you're concerned about. there is, there is a very, very fine line that we walk as immigrants and at the aclu between proimmigrant policies we don't think are preeveryoned and antiimmigrant policies that are in court every day saying they are preempted. municipal ids an example and various cities in the country enacted mew municipal id laws available to residents of that city regardless of immigration status and groups like the

immigration reform law institute sued over laws like that, and the aclu helped defend those laws in court. >> yeah, in the back. >> hi, i was just wondering what do you think that congress had in mind when they drafted the savings clause of licensing? what made the legislative history or law or whatnot, what type of legislations would fall under that category? >> i think i mentioned earlier what we think congress really had in mind really was a quite narrow situation involving farm labor contractors, and the

legislative history there is not a lot of legislative history on this issue unfortunately, but the little that there is does support that view, our view. this -- the expressed preseemings provision i believe mentioned that this was debated on for over a decade. there was hearings and the legislative record on irca in general is huge, and the expressed preemption provision was in there for quite some time before that paraphernalia -- par renne thet call appeared. it was really late in the game, and there was really not a lot of information out there about, you know, about why that par ran thet call was there, and what

was in there does support our position. i don't know if others want to comment on that. >> i would just say that it's like a three sentence chunk of a clause that jennifer was talking about, and it's unclear the way the sentence is structured whether the form laws are supposed to be the proper scope of what that's applying to or whether they are just an example or just to do business more broader, generally within the state so it's hard discerning exactly what they were trying to get at. >> right. i should at at most we think you have to be talking about a genuine bone fied licensing scheme, and that means a law that regulates a business to conduct a certain kind of activity. >> yeah, right here. >> i can speak loud. >> it's recording. >> okay. several of you have touched on

this, and i'd like to go back on this and hear more about what effect you think this has on the 1070 litigation or what correlation you think there is between the two of them? >> i'm happy to answer first. i don't know if others have thoughts on this. i think, you know, one thing i should mention before i answer your question about 1007 is there is another case and that's he has lton out of the third circuit involving an employment provision that's very similar to the one at issue in this case, and then is also involves a housing provision that prohibits landlords from renting to undocumented immigrants essentially. the third circuit invalidated both halfs of that law, the housing and employment piece and they reached the direct opposite conclusion that the 9th circuit reached and the deadline for

cert on that case may be the day of argument nation. -- in this case. it will be interesting to see what happens. i think the defendants expect they will file a cert petition, and what happens after that nobody knows, but the employment issue obviously is going to be controlled by what happens in this case, but the housing issue in that case is there's numerous other laws in the country at the state and local level, mostly the local levels that are similar to the housing piece. that's another type of antiimmigrant law that's out there, and then there's sb1070, that is another kind of law, but that one deals more with the question whether into what extent state and local law enforcement authorities can directly enforce immigration law sort of independently of, you know, the permission of or the specific program for cooperation with the federal government. that's sort of the big picture

question in the sb1070 case. i think, you know, i think that the strict lawyer answer is the legal questions in this case are very different from the legal questions in the sb1070 case even though they both generally involve preemption. you know, the court could say something about preemption doctrine to impact the 1070 case, and i think it was mentioned earlier that 1070 is pending in the 9th circuit. they just had argument in that case a bit ago, and the case that's pending is actually a suit filed by the united states. that's the case pending in the 9th circuit right now. you know, the court could say something about preemption doctrine to impact 1070. the court could say something more generally that would serve as a great deterrent for states or an inacceptabilityive for -- incentive for states to enact

these laws in general. i think that would be the closest things that would impact 1070 other than something that has to do with preemption doctrine. i think it's entirely possible that the court may not say, you know, the court may be pretty harmonious on what it says, and that would not really impact 1070 that much because the question in 10 70 is not about, you know, irca or the immigration reform and control act, it generally has nothing to do with employment of unauthorized workers and the question is what can arizona state and local police do when interacting with immigrants and can they enforce civil immigration laws. >> i think upon the distinction earlier on preseemings and implied preemption. if this is expressed preemption, then its reach is limited because it will focus on the employment based laws.

if the court resolves this case on an implied preemption ground, there could be other implications for all of these other areas in a more significant way. >> which will determine what way they roll. my sense is because the party focused first and foremost on what the preemption clause means and what licensing me, if they strike the law down under expressed preemption ground, they don't need to go on to implied preseemings. if they don't, then you have to address the implied preemption part of it in which case it could have greater spill over in consequences. >> any questions? no. well, with that then -- oh, sorry, one more. >> i'm greg store with bloomberg news. i want to clarify what you were saying there. i mean, i know that the implied

argument is different than the two provisions. are you suggesting that if the court gives to imply preemption on the employer sanctions issue, that's where it's really big, but a ruling, they have to get to implied preemption on e-verify, that is likely to have less impact on 1070 and other laws? >> yeah, exactly. jennifer made that clarification earlier. there's two preemptive issues in the case. there's the employer sanctions part of it which is salient if the court doesn't strike it down, and there's a question about e-verify which as you say is only an implied preemption challenge. the point we're making is that the implied preemption argument is the one that could have salience for the 1070 debate. e-verify case the court will get to it, but the nature of it is

it is bound up with e-verify, and it's likely that would have spill over than a implied solution on the employer's part of it. >> there it does depend a little bit -- the nature of the claim is essentially that congress set up a voluntary program, and the state is making it mandatory. it also could be -- if it comes out the way the 9th circuit did, it will depend on how the court regards the policy objectives that underlie federal law. the court wants to say that the congress' objecteddives are to, you know, expand enforcement in a dramatic way, that could have consequences, but not to the same extent on the other claim. >> okay, great, well then, join me in thanking our panel. [applause]

and class is dismissed. [laughter] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >> last week a british prime minister was questioned by the committee members about his government's proposed budget cuts. that's next on c-span2. the british government will compensate gan town moe

detainees and we'll hear from that later. after that, remarks from the incoming republican governors legislated in this month's elections. tomorrow morning, former and current government analysts gather to discuss ideas for improving the federal budget process and balancing the budget. this conference is hosted by the american association for budget and program analysis. live coverage begins at 8:45 a.m. eastern.

>> last week british prime minister, david cameron, took questions from the committee, a tradition that began with prime minister, tony blair. he defended the proposed spending cuts and the timetable for withdrawing troupes from afghanistan. this event is 2.5 # hours. [inaudible conversations] >> order, order. welcome, prim minister. it's your first appearance before the committee, chairs of the counselor committee, departments, and the warehouse itself. the first of these sessions i reiterate not for your benefit, but from others is different

from wednesday's question time, literally. there's no political jousting between leaders, and lots of quick exchanges on national points, but to hold to account the role that you play and your office plays in the determination of government policy, and we think your input has been decided or significant which with the individual departments in our own committees and now it's your turn, and we're going to start with a major section on the comprehensive spending review. the sector has been questioned in detailed and other ministers by the committees, but how often will you involve simply in order to broker agreement or referee arguments between the treasury and departments? how often was that a reason for

your involvement? >> well i was involved from the start setting the strategy for the comprehensive review and setting the overall fiscal mandate for the government, how much we were trying to get debt down and by when. when it came to the exrepsive spending review itself, i was involved both in setting the strategy, which departments were we going to try to protect, what areas we were going to try to invest in, what was the thinking behind where to make cuts and how to make them, and then i was involved in, i think, really two other ways. one was through what became known as the claude. we had a quad lateral meeting that met. i think we met nine times, and we would use those to go through some of the difficult areas and try to work out what the right

policies were and what the right approach was. the second strategy, running the quad meetings were successful in making it a collective decision and chairing cabinet with nine discussions on the spending review, and then, yes, i was involved in helping settle some of the individual departments, particularly some of the tricky difficult issues where there's some real difficult issues involved. for instance, in defense was one in particular, but other departments as well. it was a mixture of things, but hopefully mostly strategic and collective than its been in the past. >> the cases where there was a dispute were not necessarily the ones in which you had the greatest interest in steering the policy in a particular direction, so how often were you intervening in this process because you had a particular strong view about what the policy should be? >> it wasn't so much that. i mean, most of the -- there was disputes between

obviously the treasurely and the individual departments. i didn't get involved in all of those. i would get involved if they were not being resolved, and so there was one or two areas where they were not resolved, and i got in to help resolve them. i mean, the process did work given the scale of the reductions we are trying to achieve. it worked partly i think because the treasury did a good job meeting early on with cabinet colleagues, and the approach to the process how we got through difficult areas in protecting education in early years, what about housing, how will we make sense the welfare? we had proper substantial meetings between liberal and democrat chairmans in the coalition to talk through the issues. one other point. i think the reason why it went relatively smoothly is that we took a big decision at the

beginning, which i think is inetble if you're trying to reduce public spending and get the deficit under control, that you got to look at the very big areas of public spending like pay pension and welfare because if you don't do that, you're going to make unacceptable cuts in schools and hospitals and policing, and we did, i think, make some quite big decisions on welfare, i think 18 billion together on reductions in public sector pay, we froze public sector pay for two years, and in the area of public sector pensions, there will be increased contributions, so those three big areas and big decisions made the rest of the spending review not easy. it was extremely difficult because of the reductions we were looking for, but that set the framework. >> was it more difficult in some areas? >> no, because as i said if you don't do things on welfare pay and pensions, you would have to

cut far more own education and other areas. i thought that was unacceptable, and if you want the budget deaf silt under control, look at the big areas of public spending as i said rather than just thinking you can have cuts across the board in every department. that would have been unstrategic. we wanted to protect various departments, the health service, overseas aid, and effectively the school's budget. we took a view to protect capital spending to invest in the recovery and protected capital spending and make sure while we were making spending there was a fairness and social mobility, so if you look through the decision, for instance, to increase nursery education and bro deuce a pupil premium to help people from low income bakeds to go to the university, there's a strong strain of social that goes right through the spending round decisions. we took the decisions early on

that those were our aims, and the spending decisions had to flow from the aims rather than just making the numbers add up. >> those issues on the education, do they require late intervention from you and the deputy prime minister? >> they were decided at the meetings and myself and the chief and other ministers as well in discussing welfare and uncle smith was there, that was where we decided the strategy or as i say which departments to protect the strain of fairness that we wanted to run through the spending round and the decision to support the recovery by not seeking further reductions no capital spending, but increased that from the plans we inherited. >> this spending review is described as comprehensive, but it wasn't really, was it? there was quite a bit of areas that was untouchable at the start. >> that's right. i mean, in the conservative

manifesto, we wanted to protect the nhs, and we ensured that in our negotiation with the democrats that went into the coalition agreement that the nhs would be protected. i know that's a contentious decision that some don't agree with. i think it's right on two grounds if i way. one is that the cost pressures in the health service are huge anyway. drugs budget, ages population, new treatments coming on stream. i think it is difficult enough to have an nh budget increasing with inflation. i make no bones about it. if you're trying to get from the biggest budget deficit in the g20 to blabsing the books, you have to take the country with you. the thing i care about most, and most people in the country care about most is our national health service is there if we get sick. i think it is right morally that you ask the country to go

through a difficult time together to protect the future on something we agree on. >> you are agreeing it was a seem comprehensive we view at best, and you bought off various pieces of opposition as you put it to take the country with you by excluding a number of areas. >> well, i mean, i think it is a comprehensive review if that we took decisions right across every single department. it was a decision and there will have to be efficiencies in the health service. that was part of a comprehensive set of decisions. >> you'll understand that ireland is high in the news at the moment, and i passed warning to your office that i might ask about ireland. do you want now to crush the widespread reports on a contingency basis plans that are afoot for a bilateral bailout?

>> i mean, first of all it's not right to speculate about the financial health of another country in the european union and a country that is a neighborhood, a good friend, and a country that we have good economic and political relations with. let me say, obviously if you look at the relationship between brit tan and ireland, it's a big export markets. as i said in the house the other day, we export more to ire land than brazil and russia combined, but that nonetheless is the fact. we have an interest in not just the euro being a success, but we have an interest in ireland being a success, so i certainly don't want to rule things out, but as i say, i don't think we should be speculating. >> that'd be special conditions with a special relationship we have with ireland that might lead one want to do a bailout rather than use the purely

european mechanism? >> well, i'll make one point about the european mechanism so everybody understands because i think it's important. the last government before the new government came to office agreed in the european union, this european financial mechanism, which is basically is there to help countries that get in trouble. it's established under qualified majority voting, and it was sported by the last government. it was not something that we advised, and that is a mechanism that is there and can pay out money to support countries that are in trouble. that exists, and we are part of that whether we like it or not. >> perhaps, just one general question with respect to that. do you -- have you in your planning, and i presume there's planning on

board the facts that a bilateral bailout comes out the bottom line and increases the deficit and therefore also the numbers in the csi unlike the contingency bailout? >> the point you make is we are not speculating. the point you make is absolutely right that money lent to other countries by the mechanism is a con ting gent liability and they use the head room between the european budget on what they spend and able to spend. they use that headroom to make a loan of the that's not money you have to go out and raise where as a bilateral loan is min you have to get out and raise in order to lend -- >> and you have to come to the house for approval. >> i think in any event what if these things were to happen, obviously, one would want to have an early discussion in the house of commons. >> and one can take it from your answers that you are heavily

engaged in the issues? >> well, i think i've tried to answer the question as best as i can. >> [inaudible] given article iii of the mechanism you referred to, can only be activated under the regulations, european regulations government list, can only be activated by ireland itself, and not by qualified majority vote, and is the chancellor and the coalition government joining up with germany and the other member states to participate in this mechanism before it is agent vatted -- before it is activated, and why are the european bank and commission in bub lin before the -- dublin before it is activated and isn't the views against the prime minister that they can manage for the time being.

why are we not taking part in the mechanism and not doing a bilateral arrangement to do it outside the european framework? >> we're not trying to coerce ireland to do anything. that's not any part of our plans. ic the technical -- i think the technical position you put is absolutely right, and i don't reel want to go into -- really go into any conversations of the rest of europement i think that counts as a speculation. i think the position as you and i understand it is that this mechanism exists. it is operated by qmv. britain is a part of it because of the action of the last government. it has funds available because of the way it was set up, and that is the situation that we inherited. >> but the key of the operates, once you're in the system, it has to be activated by ireland, and they said they don't want in at this stage. >> i can't answer for the irish

government honestly. >> both options are still open or neither might be perceived that is to say the european mechanism and the bilateral mechanism. >> i think there's a right in saying that, but i think going any further is speculating in the face of another country, and i don't think i should do that. >> i want to get back to the grips of the exrensive spending review. you said, and i think there's consensus on this across parliament that we should do all we can to find the money back on savings so to protect frontline services. my committee undertook is study of the value for money savings that was sought in the last conference of spending reviews, and i think despite it being an imperative as a machinery of government, the department failed to deliver only 40% of savings so far, and only a third of those were genuine value for money savings as opposed to

cuts. now, if -- i wish you the best in your attempt to succeed in this endeavor of finding genuine money savings, but were you to tail, would you then find other cups or lawing the 81 billion pound target? >> i think -- you put the question fairly. i think one the reasons why in the past some of the value for money savings have not been found is that there wasn't quite the same need to find them. departments were often faced by rising biaslines and told then go ahead, and save more money if you can to spend more, and the savings were not found. we're in a different situation because, you know, departments really can see that in some cases their baselines are reduced, and so they're going to have to work with the help of the office cabinet and others to make sure they look at back off costs, central administration first, and they are being helped by a government that is freezing

public sector pay, reducing welfare payments, and dealing with the issue of public sector pensions all of which benefit or two which benefit the problem at the same time. now, we're not planning for failure in finding these savings, but the savings we set out across the four years need to be achieved, and we want to achieve the maximum amount of them through the sort of efficiencies that you talk about. i think it's wort -- >> and if you don't, that was the question because, you know, i can see we had on yesterday, so i can see there's a real endeavor ironically to centralize control rather strongly in cabinet office to ensure the savings are secured, but i have to say that i'm skeptical as to whether you would achieve what you have set out to do, and really what i'm interested in is if were that to happen, would you then come back to further or then reconsider

your 81 billion pounds? .. >> using an example they can change the pay and conditions

and changing paper work which will go in addition. the departments have got to do this and if it is worth reminding and ask why are we doing this, why are we trying to do so much within the parliament and the fact is if we were not doing this, if we took the plans we inherited, then at the end of the parliament we would still have a structured around 3%. it would be adding to the debt to gdp ratio in simple terms but would still be getting worse so after all of the cuts the situation would still be getting worse and it seems to me that is not a sensible way to go back and the situation within the parliament we have effectively dealt with most. >> i'm skeptical without [inaudible] can i give you sort three examples of the work we've done today of the short-term decision that can have a longer-term

impact or perhaps it is a pun intended consequence my first examples the are facing a start. the of 18 million accounts going back between 2004, 2005 to 2007, 2008 where people pay too much or too little and tax. they told us last friday they are writing off three in terms of money only to the government which is writing off of 650 million pounds. with the lack they are unlikely to be able to tackle seven, 08 and the total amount owed to the government is 1.4 billion. now your unintended consequence is cutting staff and then losing money leading to further cuts

elsewhere. >> i asked the treasury specifically that issue but in the spending review we did announce yes there are efficiencies of being driven through h m rc as other departments but we did announce a specific investment into -- and, second, in order to raise an additional amount. >> apologists say that is what we've been told by them is it is an additional -- >> the point i made it is separate. >> it would be the collection of 1.4 billion. >> weekend xm out departments from trying to be more efficient. the was a separate decision made in the hmrc. >> let me take another example.

atacama understand the reason for delaying it but the reality is we have to spend 1.2 to 1.4 billion extra on extending the life and we have to spend an extra billion on an extra order for the submarine to keep the vero ship building capacity. is that sensible? >> i would agree about the second part it is part of the defense program and it should be part of the program so i would support but that decision because i think it is the right decision we took and the strategic defense review from the decision we've taken where i asked very specifically trademark we look very closely at the costs of the replacement, can we see how much is necessary

to spend both now and in the future, can we look now with the experience of the current vanguard submarines operating, can we make a better estimate of health longer the life is, and it might come back very clearly from the officials which we accepted was you could make this decision a little bit later, you could put off some of the spending from the parliament and overrule that wouldn't add to the cost of the decision to take and so this was part of -- i know we are going to come on to the strategic defense review. as part of a fairly thorough peace. >> i have to say to you you don't yet know in terms of the additional cost but go ahead and we do know the additional new vanguard submarine so from our point of view the committees shall use their money and looks to us like a short-term decision with a long-term extra expenditure for government.

>> i believe that it's a reduction of 750 million pounds over spending and some 3 billion pounds the next three years, but i'm sure the defense minister or treasury would come from the committee and go into detail but we are doing a defense review i think it's important to let the cost in that review and we have said the date was saved over 700 pounds in the spending review period and we are still spending significantly on the replacement during the period. i was assured that we would do this bringing in having no capability between the existing submarines and the new submarines, and i was told it was possible to do this without spending and seems therefore it is a sensible thing to do. >> -- what role did you play in the defense review?

>> again, the chairmanship who rule i would say i shared the national security council committee as it were the leading cabinet committee we have established which i think works extremely well, met about 18 times since the government was formed. seven of the meetings specifically covered the strategic defense review so why shared those meetings in order to first set the strategy to follow as a country what are the biggest threats and opportunities to us and flowing on that strategy what posture we ought to take and flowing from that the decisions we ought to to but submarines and all the rest of it. in addition to that sort of german chaparral, obviously the service chiefs have a direct line to the prime minister and the like to make it known when they do that. but very good exchanges and conversations and i had a number of bilateral meetings with the

defense secretary and the chancellor and played quite a role of the and that was a gap between the treasury and ministry depends quite widely reported on and i helped bring together both parties of the and to get what i think was a good and sensible outcome. mostly a strategic chairman role with a bit of interference at the end. >> so it was in the most difficult of the spending report? >> yes, i think it was for a couple of reasons. one is it was one of the most overspent departments, it was a train crash when we took over in terms of 30 billion axis of commitments plaza de statistics -- said the exchange from the 38 -- >> 38 billion chondrite, 38 billion overspent and fantastically important area we have to get right, plus it was part defense was part of an

overall strategic security and defense review and putting other areas as well so that made it particularly complicated and then with and there were one of two areas like the decision of the aircraft carriers which is a fantastically difficult question to try to get the right answer to. now we got the right answers but it took a lot of time and a lot of work and it was tough. >> and so we have the letter from the security fence to you which somehow found its way. what effect did that have on the operation? >> i don't think it had a huge impact. they stood up for the departments and make the case for the departments and sometimes the do it already and sometimes it appears [inaudible]

and there is a problem and that problem does seem to have had a bit of a problem with the leaks in the press responsible for security. i do think it made a huge difference. the fact is i think that it was a good outcome in terms of here we are as a country, this deficit we have to deal with it. the fed may modest contribution with 8% real terms of production over the for your period and that doesn't touch at all what we are doing in afghanistan that is funded of the reserve, and i think a set of good and long term decisions were made over things like carriers and army members and the future requirements for the air force which are right. >> it wouldn't have been so influential, would it, if it was just between him and you, it wouldn't have had nearly as much. >> i think the point is because

it was the most difficult area to deal with the were always going to be more discussions of the defense and the tricky process is getting it right and perhaps other departments. i'm not trying to be evasive. of course they don't, they add to the public pressure. the meetings are having under huge external scrutiny. everyone wants to know what happened after the national security council, that national security council. to have a meeting now not interested. so it tends to the pressure but don't think that it would change what was when genuine collective discussion and i don't want to underestimate this when we talk about the defense of the and i did kingdom for the first time in a long time in the national security council there was the business department, the development, defense, primm minister, foreign secretary, having the discussion about what is the right defense posture of

the u.k., where do we spend money in order to deliver it, and i think this is very helpful way throughout the whole spending review process to try to make it more collective come more collegiate, more of a government coming together and discussing these things rather than bilaterally between the chancellor and secretary of state or pri minister just the chancellor sitting on the sofa. we tried to have more of a collective discussion about it. >> i will turn to that in just a moment. there is one question which, there are several questions but the uplift for the defense budget from 2015 and on words, you sit on the day of the security review mckeown strong who view is the structure would require year-on-year we terms in the defense budget in the year beyond 2015. so that is your own view.

is clearly the center states for defense strong view but rather audibly it seems not to be the government. what do you intend to do to turn your own house strong view into government policy? >> the short answer to that is put it in a manifesto election. >> that would work because if that view is not government policy, the ministry defense is going to have to start making a really severe cuts with of the 2012 onward. >> i don't accept that. i see the point is the ministry of defence has now got what it hasn't had for a long time, it's got its subject members of until 2015. it knows that one party has committed to not specified between 2015 and 2020. i think it is necessary to deliver the sort of force levels that affect that we've talked about for 2020.

it's for the parties to make these views clear but i think it is a great planning horizon frankly for a long time. two years ago, three years ago there they were massively overspent, 30 billion pounds without a clue what was going to happen next. the got a much better position than now quite frankly with the department of budget that is basically a flat 34 billion, give or take a bit through five years what we've got to do was make sure we've got good people in the ministry defense making sure we get the funding for money. a new permanent secretary, new chief of the defense staff we need to get a new chief of defense material and people in the department to make sure that it delivers the very large amounts of the taxpayers' money they're going into it. >> but in the defense review you also announced a ten year budget for the minister of defence. so presumably, you will be

building into a comprehensive spending review before the next election. the sorted uplift you are saying is you're strong view and should be -- >> this averitt question. two answers to that. one of the closet of a defense review every four or five years that will help this process. of course this will be a debate within government unsure about what more we can say about defense spending that will be discussed and debated between now and 2015, but we are in a coalition. i think we have come to a very good outcome on the defense review. we've shown that to parties that have a rather different track records and can come together and make sense of a really difficult set of questions and i'm sure will go and do that. >> primm minister, it is widely understood the decisions to withdraw was a last-minute decision made over the weekend

before the review, and until then they were sustained, and that decision was widely attacked, and that provoked a reaction between the better and the times. does it have a role in suggesting or promoting the idea of that letter and interesting than to try to close down the debate? >> on the letter, i fred both letters i'm delighted the chief wrote such a powerful what her to be made but i don't have the letter that came into being to simply don't know. i wouldn't be tall surprised, but i don't know. >> i can't answer the question because i don't know. i would be happy to write to you. i think it is really genuinely difficult and fascinating who writes what letter i think is

less important. the reason the decision was made for the fleet was that this was the most difficult question at the heart of the defense review we debated and discussed as a national security council over and over again and i will tell you my own, how my own view changed to give you a sort of sense of how deeply this was discussed. coming at this it seems to me at first cut the obvious answer was to keep the existing carriers and use that as a bridge to the new carriers when they came in. that's the sort of simple and mature straightforward you. you don't have the capability and so therefore you retire the tornadoes. but mine was repeatedly convinced by the end of the process that while that was the easiest thing to explain in parliament to the media, to the public it was the wrong decision

and i was convinced it was the wrong decision and we have made the right decision which is to keep the tornado quarrier except in the capable the gap between having the carrier now and the carrier in the future. for the following reasons. one, tornado is the more capable aircraft. hearing it is a fantastic record. i grew up with admiration with the aircraft did, but the fact is today the tornado has more aircraft operating of afghanistan and second the big question right now is how can we best support our troops in afghanistan and that is keeping the tornado. and even if we can't -- >> that's why i think we did come to the more difficult for the right to view of trying to explain it to the committee in a way to try to prove this was a proper discussion and debate process rather than a sort of

let's do what is politically convenient. it was much easier to keep and say there we are reducible to answer if it is the wrong answer >> is it acceptable if they start to enter political diplomacy in the three and it's important we do get to the bottom of that and would await your reply when he gave evidence before the treasury select committee speaking about the letter said that it was a letter written to be leaked, and sure you didn't see it that way, did you, prime minister? >> no, it was a letter written to the view of secretary of state of importance of not making too deep cuts in defense and if you look at what we did, you know, 7.5 reduction over four years as a lot less than the reductions in other

departments. and i think when you look at the asset we are getting to that money, when you look at the army of the air force you can see we're still of the fourth biggest defense budget in the world. i think we can over to the gloom about this. we are going to have the best summary anyone [inaudible] >> how thoroughly did you examine the scope of the contract? >> fairly thorough. that creates some basis for negotiation to estimate this is a question i asked repeatedly and we go back to the eni can we look at the contract, can we see if we can change the contracts but the answer is pretty clear, and i think maybe this is something a select committee

might want to look into. they were pretty tightly drawn and we are in a situation where if you even council the second of the two it would have cost a huge sum of money. in order to look into it a select committee would meet the contract. i recognize there would be some aspects that would be security confidential. but would you agree to provide that contract to my select committee with the security aspects to enable us to examine the extent of the use of the scope for negotiation? >> what we can under the rules. >> i wish it was as simple as that. you find out and destroyed you don't quite as many rules as you would like. i will certainly look into it and do what we can. >> thank you very much. >> per minister, you and your party said your committed to a

widening participation in higher education. a recent study by the institute of fiscal studies has reported that educational measurements have, quote, significantly raised stay on rates post 16 students from low-income but runs and indeed the educational success a rising actually pays for itself. if the government were the winter run of to the general election why is it now being removed and what steps are being taken to replace it? >> we've had to look at every area of spending very closely because of the catastrophic state of the public finances that were inherited. 11% budget deficit, the biggest in the g20, the situation that put us into an economic danger zone, that we had to come out. we look to the educational maintenance elements specifically and while there is a piece of research that you quote, there is another piece of

quite well thought through research that shows that 90% of the money is effectively dead weight cost paid to people who would stay on. it seems to me there are two points to make. one is we are going to be legislating to raise the effective participation age and education to 18, and if we are doing that, does it really makes sense to be paying people to stay on at the same time as doing that? secondly, as part of a process in trying to drive trust and decision making down to the lowest levels in this country, we will actually be enhancing the amount of money and resources that college and school kids have to try to target sort of money on people who need it most. now i think that is, frankly, a better approach than the one that we inherited. but i accept the there will be a spending reduction in this area. >> and wendi to anticipate the proposals coming on stream? >> we are looking at this at the moment. i think there will be an announcement forthcoming in the

period ahead. i don't have the exact date whether this will be introduced. >> so there is a considerable gap between the implementation of the cuts and the implementation of these proposals which seek to enter the issues. what is going to happen in the meantime? >> i don't think there should be a gap. there will be phasing out of the ema and the introduction of the discretionary lerner's fund. as i said, we are moving to the situation where we will actually be which is leading to raise the participation aged 18. and again, we have to make big decisions about how to focus the money on education. the decision we made is to put the money into the school's budget. that's why the spending people is being frozen accursed parliament and we are introducing a 2.5 billion-pound people premium over and above that so that pupils from the

poorest backgrounds have more money selling them to whatever school they choose to go into our education system. at the same time we are getting rid of a lot of specific grants, trusting the hit teachers with the maximum amount of money we can for them to choose how they are going to spend it and there's a different approach to the last government that i think had a lot of different budgets for education, which made it very complicated, and we think it is right to trust the hit teachers more. >> and will you have a mechanism for the funding fe colleges? >> yes, we will. again, we are looking for a more decentralized, less bureaucratic mechanism than what we have inherited. i don't know what you have talent but always one might have gone around fe colleges the have complained about the massive duplication of the number of bodies that they have to go to for funding and they would like a similar system. a bit like the hefc for

universities that are going to have a further education funding which will be simpler than the myriad bodies that have inherited. >> can i want to the implications of the rise in tuition fees because as a result of the proposal somebody going three university could potentially it can lead up to 40,000 pounds of debt on tuition and accommodation given that it is much harder to sell benefits of a university education to students from low-income and lois grayson families, the benefits of the university education to students -- this will be a huge challenge to keep the level of up and indeed the latest show after a rise of two about 2,000 a day has been dropping in comparison. it puts additional responsibilities. can you tell me are you going to keep it and are you going to

replace it? and haulier has been very successful. >> i can't give specifics on a multi-year but i think the most important thing is the new system we are introducing, because students will pay anything up front and no one starts paying back until the early 21,000 pounds compared with 15,000 pounds now means that it is a more progressive system, and i think it will be possible to encourage people from low-income backgrounds to go into universities with this sort of system. it comes out as the brown review commissioned by the leader government but with conservative support and it does give a boost to the arrangements. so a combination. nobody pays up front, you don't pay anything back until you earn 21,000. this makes it a much more progressive system. on the totally accept we still have a challenge to get out of schools and deprived areas and encourage people to apply to

university. we will never get social mobility, as we do that. if you look at the policies we are adopting as a whole, the of the people premium getting free time at the university, think all of those can help us as a government and is a country encourage people to apply to universities. >> i want to move on to the science budget as a whole. i'm on record as what it has done in maintaining the flat cash for the council budgets. but you said an earlier response you tried the discussions. i've been probing an area and i can't get a straight answer, perhaps you will give it to me. there is an interaction between the brown report, the science settlement, department of

science budgets, the immigration cap, the rda's closure on the overall capacity for science in the u.k.. what advice would you give on the interaction of those things? >> crikey come if to brains can't answer that question, i don't know what hope there is for me but let me try to get dressed all, the flat cash settlement for science is a good baseline for science in our country. there is an interaction between what's happening at the university and say the immigration rules as well. i would argue that they are all heading in a pro science direction. on the university changes, because we are giving focus and support other hefce support on science degrees, and i think that this system of contributions is quick to focus the mind of the undergraduate

much more on what is a good cause, what is a good university, what will give me a good start in her life? i think all of that is very pro science. on immigration would i would say is what we're looking at in the system we inherited and yes, having the control immigration which the country badly needs, 200,000 net immigration is too high and needs to come down, but within that, we should have proper regard to people who can come to the country and make a contribution right now the system doesn't really look like that as i try to see in the house yesterday people are coming in on the so-called sere one indignant doing unskilled jobs. >> so you're quite right [inaudible] >> perhaps you could just tell us when you expect the criteria to be known on immigration system. >> we are getting through this effectively. i would hope the next week we might be able to make enough

progress to make an announcement. >> all of your answers are predicated on "i think." are incorrect in saying you didn't receive any of fisa with the collective impact of all of these issues, one upon another. that might need some thinking about. we haven't got a strategy that engages us on issues like whether we are going to attract people to come in and be aware successful nobel prize winners. how many university departments are going to close as a result of this policy? you don't know the answer to that, do you? >> i specifically asked to see the chief scientific adviser when i became prime minister and had a proper meeting with him about the big items on his agenda to make sure this was a pro science government. i appointed as our science minister someone who might use it to support, david is one of the brightest, talented in the house of commons. i think it is a proton

misgovernment. of course lots of different policies will have an impact on science and i would hope to demonstrate they will have a good effect. but that's why we have a chief scientific adviser. >> finally it is a great pity therefore that the chief scientific adviser said to the lord he was disappointed on the changes in his own department on the education supplement yesterday had this headline stupid and ignorant foolish expressed dismay at potential loss of scientific expert tees in the merged bis post. now although david assured me today that my concerns and the concerns of the scientific community will be met isn't it time we had some more transparency, proper engagement with the scientific community to stop these mistakes from being made?

>> perhaps i should take away what you have said. i think what i'm finding is the system have a new chief scientific adviser and india scientific advisers in each department is a way of helping to make government policy science friendly. have we correct the problem completely? no, i don't think we have but i think it is quite a good start. >> may i transport to louise ellman? >> at the beginning of this meeting, you told us that you have been involved in taking a strategic look at the cuts that he had wanted to protect capital spending. you name and number of service areas that you had taken that approach too. i was a little disappointed you didn't mention transport in that. looking at the actual facts, rather than the rhetoric around the facts, capital spending in transport is actually being cut by 11% and resource spending cut

by 20%. now, that doesn't suggest that in reality you see transport has such an important engine for growth. >> i am afraid i would dispute your figures. we are going to be spending over 30 billion pounds of transport infrastructure in the next four years and that is actually more than the last government had planned. so those are the facts. but overall we are spending about 9 billion more on capital projects than the last government planned. now the reason i didn't have to get too involved in the transport budget is that the negotiations between the department of transport and the treasury white quite well. they went well -- the reason they went well -- >> but the figures are in using our figures from the review and figures from the treasury review the or not figures that have come from anywhere else. it might be true that it all could have been worse but you can't say that he predicted capital spending in transport in the way that you are alleging. >> and the weekend.

the point is the last government announced a lot of cuts in capital spending. we inherited the situation. we took that, and in some cases, we added that money. so that is why i'm able to say to you that spending over 30 billion pounds of transport infrastructure in the next four years that is more than the last government planned. that is the fact. and i think that's important. the reason it was a relatively straightforward negotiation between the treasury and transport is because we had decided strategically to try to protect capital and where possible enhance capital, and so i didn't get involved in that particular area. i did have conversations with the mayor of london about the importance of the tube of greed and the importance of the cross real, both of which we have managed to protect and are going ahead, so i think it is a good settlement for transport capital. yes, like every other department, there are reductions in department spending but in terms of capital spending would say it is a very good outcome.

>> there is clearly a dispute on the figures and facts which we will pursue elsewhere. the moment there are very successful regional structures that have permitted local authorities to decide strategic priority. those are now being dismantled under widespread agreement that the proposed partnership would not be able to replace death of pune with -- what are you going to do to make sure the regional role are the permanent way? >> i would come at a slightly different angle because i think the regional bodies were often quite bureaucratic, quite distant, and in some cases there were endless studies done, but not much actual action.

so why don't think it was a perfect system. >> in this instance, specifically about transport and how the regional allocations of transport decided and all the evidence from around the country is that the existing structures, local authorities working with business, were very effective in that regard. they are going. there is no clear effect of replacement. in the committee in birmingham and in the last couple of weeks from your secretary of state who said that some other structure will have to be put forward for transport. are you going to take a personal interest? >> i will. it is important that we get money properly. it should be done on the basis of what has the greatest economic return. we ask degette questions about what is going to have the greatest impact on growth. and those transport infrastructure developments for instance are going ahead with the a11 in norfolk, the improvements on the m4 and m5

north of crystal -- >> otherwise i will start asking you about a11. [laughter] [inaudible] -- is trying to get at the issue how you were going to get decisions of regional implications again. >> the danger is that without an effective region structure for making decisions on a regional rather than local the decisions of the need effectively or they will become centralized. your secretary of state admitted to the transport committee that if the criteria adopted nationally were applied absolutely we would have more and more investments in london and the southeast and overheating of the southeast and less investment in the other regions that is why it is very important that there is a regional perspective. wiltz to take a personal interest in ensuring that in this change that you have already decided on a regional perspective and regional

prioritization will not be lost in case of transport? >> yes, absolutely. i would say that we can make a success of the local interest partnerships because they will go with the grain of what people want locally and regionally. if you look of the decisions we took in the spending ground there were major investments and are even more that will be announced in the regions. and the government is extremely conscious of that. >> can i make a helpful suggestion that he might like to write to us just to clarify [inaudible] prime minister, if we look back over 60 years, we surely cannot be content about the current state of the rail network, apart from one or two shining excels of major improvements and passengers are currently breezing themselves for another hike in fares. doesn't this make it more important that we get the nature of franchising right and that

such evidence as this suggests longer franchisees will encourage the successful bidder to invest more in partnership with the network real to bring about the kind of improvement that will ease the total amount being spent to improve the network? >> i basically agree with that. i think short-term franchisees that if it isn't the incentive on the operator to invest in the long-term health of the line and its success. i see where we need to go was longer-term franchisees but with tough penalties if they don't live up to the things they've promised to do. but i think we also have to have a good look at why the costs in the industry have gotten so out of control and roy mcnulty is doing the review for us.

because you have had experience in your own constituency where there has been an examination of the case for an extension of the line where the cost figures are absolutely astronomical. we have to get the bottom of why it is the case. >> [inaudible] >> look at the way in which you helped to try and join of government thinking in a number of respects, particularly looking at housing benefit changes. do you accept the fundamental problem here is the level of housing benefit bill has risen because the cost of housing has risen, fundamentally because this is a shortage of supply? is it the government objected to rectify that and as the housing minister said to build more houses before the recession why the csr has the money for the new affordable housing been cut by more than 50%? >> i think it is an extremely good question. we've got to ask ourselves what we have been chasing ourselves around in a circuit of increased housing benefit, increased cost,

increased housing if it and calls and also will not building in greenhouses. it seems to me we've got to do two things. one is for the deficit problem, but we've got to look at the explosion of housing and if it up by 50% over the past five years. we have to look at that because we have to get on top of the deficit. we also have to ask ourselves whether we can have a system that would encourage more housing building and that would ease the concerns of supply. although widely completely accept yes, we have cut the capitol money going into house building, i would argue that the system wasn't working. we had big capital allocations and housing for the last decade. hasn't worked. it has pushed up the price of land. anyone owning a bit of land has done extremely welcome thank you, but we don't seem to have built three many houses. so what we are doing, as i have said is getting on top of the housing benefit, making some difficult decisions have been introducing some real changes to how we support social housing

and how we support house building in the carriage house building which i believe will make a difference. for instance, the new homes bonus will mean that from now one when the liberal authorities build houses in that area or allow houses to be built the lead charlie benefit. right now there is a benefit to any of our interests and our society to support house building. and we need to change that fundamental regard in a more decentralized -- i think what answer. >> just taking of the first point about the new way of from the affordable housing, the new way actually is to make new lessons of houses of the new housing built. has anything been done on how that would increase the bill of housing and if it? >> what we believe it will do, first of all, how it will affect house building i think the fact is if you go to a rental based model that gives home builders the confidence that they would build a social housing they don't sort of rent derwood to

the will to get into that with 66 >> it will put some pressure on the housing benefits and that is another reason for trying to make sure we get on top of the housing benefit situation which is what we are doing. >> can you point to one piece of evidence that shows that if you redistribute the planning grant is available for this purpose among the number of houses that you need to build to beat the previous government's progress before the recession came out what amount to about 1,300 pounds per property? that really goes to be a disincentive to the building or than 200,000 in this country? is there evidence of that? >> yes if you ask local authority leaders -- the ones i've spoken to say right now also there's a lot of targets there's not really much in it for us as a local authorities are building houses because we

don't really keep the revenue whereas under the new homes bonus they will keep the additional revenue they get. it is quite a big move we are trying to make from the very top down centralized system to a system where we say to local authorities is to attract business into your area you keep the business rate. if you get more houses built you keep the revenue for the extra houses. it is a change in the system, but i think it is given what we just had didn't produce the houses and the rocketing housing benefit bill and a record number of people on housing waiting list so think it's time to try something new. >> given the level of housing benefit changes not just in london but of sight in the 30th percentile rule will actually mean that areas of cities such as sheffield are no longer afford people want a house in benefit including those who work on the low incomes, is it still the government's policy to have mixed community or is there now we disjunction between the policies of the dwp and the

busbee eight? >> something we are trying to do is widely shared across the political spectrum which is we move to a situation where we are not asking working people to pay taxes to support people in housing benefit fonted houses -- >> i think the general principle just enunciated -- >> perhaps it goes against mixed communities than? >> no, has lakes when we have is attrition now we do have people claiming per year and housing benefits 20, 30, 40, 50,000 pounds. and you have people in sheffield paynter taxes so that people can live in houses they themselves couldn't dream of living in. >> began the but you just said, primm minister, the housing

benefit bill had to be brought under control and you have given some examples. there is quite a lot of different aspects to the policy and the cuts in housing benefit, and i want you to comment on one particular one because i don't understand the rationale for it. i heard the rational for the other ones and this one is by news [inaudible] they often lose to% of the housing benefit. now i've looked through everything that i have received and i cannot see and haven't heard a government minister explain the rationale behind that particular decision to cut 10% from the housing and if of those who have been out of work for year. >> the rational is -- everybody knows that people on job-seekers allowance committed to some cases the fact we have job-seekers amounts of housing

and if it means the incentive to work is less because there's a danger of losing the job-seekers allowance and for housing benefit and so the idea behind the 10% reduction is to sharpen the incentives that there are to work. if you take these example of one day in london there are 34,000 people who've been on the job-seekers allowance for longer than a year. there are people who are supposed to be available for work and seeking a job. and in london there are in any given month 30,000 new fecund fees', 400,000 vacancies in the year so that's the reason for that. but let me just make one more point. 90% of people on jsa to find a job before the end of the year and we are going to be introducing the work program to make sure we all but three but the find a job as quickly as possible. so i hope this policy will have little effect as possible but nonetheless because the link of jsa housing benefit incentives to work i think it's worth some pursuing. >> that has quite a lot of effect because in the red book it is proposed the first

110 million in the year and 110 million the year after. it is not a small amount of money. you are looking perhaps to lessen the tax for one going to work because once someone has been out of work they lose 10% of their housing benefit. regardless of whether in that year they moved house to find some were cheaper. so we may have a position of someone who's done everything the governor has asked them, they have signed up for work, they are on jsa, yes, pilat appointments, they have gone to all of their interviews, applied to hundreds of jobs and with the best will in the world they have not been able to find a job. now that will be the first claim in history in this country where sanctions are brought against someone who has done everything the government has asked for

them and they are still going to lose their housing benefit. that plays a big change, but to the original question what is the rationale behind that? it's not meant to encourage people to work because the sanctions will unfold where they're going to move to the have less money to get to work to deliver the money to pay for their transport and all the other costs associated with work. >> i don't really accept that it will not increase the incentive to work because as we all know there is a problem where people are on the job seekers allowance and maximum housing benefit and that can actually be incentive not to work. [inaudible] >> some of these individuals have already moved house to the cheapest defined but after a year they will lose 10% of their housing benefit. if you are on 65 a week on jsa, to lose 10% of your house and and if it is quite a large

proportion of income and that income that is to help you get to work. what you're seeing a really doesn't add up. >> what we are seeing as we want to do more than currently happens to help people get work in the first place. the whole point of the work program it is going to give tayler helpless support, not just from the state but from voluntary bodies and private sector organizations to help these people work. so yes, there is a member scored in the red book but obviously if we can get people to work faster than that to reduce the number we will be getting more tax revenue from the people we get into work but i would have to bring you back to the problem of the housing benefit we're here is this benefit of 50% in the last five years. everyone accepts that it's out of control we have got to take steps to deal with it and we tried to take a range of different steps in the housing benefit caps, moving to the 30th percentile, this issue and a number of other things including the single room rate extension.

none of them -- i completely accept none of these are easy but if we want to get -- conservatives say we are on top of getting on the housing benefit but in saying i don't like this change or that or the other change. we have to try to find a package of changes to get housing benefits. it's not going to be radically reduced. all we are going to be a to stem the increase and perhaps more modest reduction. >> my point is this measure is counter to everything else were trying to do and also people still want jsa for your so the only get the help they've already been sanctioned. >> if we have come to a st point of disagreement. no doubt you will want to take her thoughts away and reflect on them. >> this is just from a constituency point of view. you sit, primm mr, support mixed communities. but if that is undoubtedly the case the cap of the 30th percentile you're going to be introducing in housing benefit changes will mean that poor

people cannot afford to live in rented accommodation is in nottinghill, where you live, islington, where i live or in westminster where we all work. they will be forced out to places like the ones i represent where you know there is already pressure and social unrest caused by the changes, the very rapid changes in population, the lack of affordable housing. and i simply put to you the social unrest worth paying and the impact that can have on the extreme right. >> i think, margaret, find the street in your constituency and let's go down together and ask people 20, 25, 30,000 pounds in your constituency whether they are happy to pay people whose rent bills are 30, 40, 50,000 pounds of people living in central london. that is likely to lead to social unrest when people find out how much they're paying in taxes for

people to live in houses the couldn't dream of living in themselves. >> i don't need to understand the anger in my constituency and the inability to affordable access -- >> order petraeus bixby to [inaudible] >> we would like to come down the streets in islington when you and margaret go for a visit. [laughter] you had an exchange over police numbers. this morning i telephoned the chief constable of greater manchester who confirmed to me if these cuts are implemented he will lose a quarter of his work force in four years. as you know, the police federation has talked about 20,000 front-line officers going and kpmg independent study talked about 18,000. now it is definitely going to affect front line services. do you agree? >> i don't necessarily agree

because it is going to depend on how well we manage our police forces. but the chief actually sit and a quote i didn't use yesterday is operating on about the first time he said the end result will be more resources put into front-line policing and more effective service for the people of greater manchester so should have wrote verse will the situation is unsettling which is why we are having this delete the end result more resources into the front line and i found some more figures, total police officers increased manchester, 8,000. police stuff, 4,200. whoever was in government, if gordon brown were sitting here we would both be having to reduce the home office budget and the difficult decisions and we would be saying to the police were going to have less money over the next four years, and the question i think is politicians and leaders to work

and can we try to get more for less. i don't mean to single out manchester but when you look at 4,000 staff as opposed to 8,000 officers, when you look at 187 people in human resources we have to do better than that if he himself seems to be saying the end result will be more resources put into the front line policy and get behind him to deliver that. >> yesterday you were very clear in your career to date back office staffs who kept mentioning your reply to have a list of 86 different kinds of posts that exist in a local police office. the fact is we are not expecting the police officers who we want to see on the beat visible police what the constituents want to do the kind of jobs for civil of a telephone list, he will manager or caretaker. there has to be a long. >> if anything i think frankly one of the problems is the last

government to understand the reasons of targeted number of office is we ended with officers doing h.r. and doing i.t. and back-office functions because when you set a target like that people to perverse things in order to meet it. what we have to focus on is actually visible policing on our streets and trying to minimize the back office that is there to support that. now what are we doing to help the process? we are freezing the police pay for two years. a difficult decision that will help police forces. we are looking at the allowance and trying to rationalize. so we're getting rid of the forms i mentioned yesterday through the massively reduced hours spent on police time. we need to say to the police forces and i will have this conversation in the valley what are you doing to procure your vehicles with other forces? what are you doing to share helicopter assets? what are you doing to combine your driver teams? is a huge amount. i don't want to see force

amalgamations. that was a mistake the west government made. people don't want to review have and amalgamate of different functions is a big agenda we hardly even scratch the surface. >> you're right there is a big agenda but you're own and chief constable said the most noticeable reduction in service that means not providing something that was provided before. if, as a result of these cuts, the crime rises in the valley and in other parts of the country would you look again at the budget in order to make sure the have the resources the need? >> of course this is a government with an ongoing process looking at how well we are doing and how many is being spent and the rest of it. i think we should start from the proposition we have to try to get more value. if the reform but she came to the constituency surgery to